Hi Jeff, The answer depends partly on whether you are using UniVerse or Unidata.
In general, a dimensioned matrix will be faster because you can index directly to the required item, however, you have to trade this against the cost of doing MATREAD or some equivalent to populate it. Also inserting and deleting items is tough. A dynamic array requires the system to search for the desired element which clearly could take a long time if you want something at the far end. Inserting and deleting, however, is very quick. The UniVerse/Unidata difference is that UniVerse maintains a "hint pointer" that points to the last field that you extracted. Thus, if you walk linearly from one end to the other (in either direction) it can use the hint as a starting point and get the result very quickly. If you hop around all over the place, the advantage of the hint is lessened but usually still good. My understanding is that Unidata does not support field hints. The best thing is to try experiments with realistic data sizes and access it in the same way your application would. Martin Phillips Ladybridge Systems Ltd 17b Coldstream Lane, Hardingstone, Northampton NN4 6DB, England +44 (0)1604-709200 _______________________________________________ U2-Users mailing list [email protected] http://listserver.u2ug.org/mailman/listinfo/u2-users
