CREATE AND MODIFY STRUCTURE

Create a database

This menu option is used to create new database files. If you choose it, you will be given an empty file structure with four fields: FIELD_NAME, FIELD_TYPE, FIELD_LEN and FIELD_DEC.

To add a new field to your database structure use the Down key to append a blank record and enter the following information:

1. Enter the name of your field in the Field name column (please note that field names must not begin with numbers, must not contain blanks and must be at least 2 letters long).
2. Choose the type of your field in the Field type column. You may choose C (Character) - if your field will contain characters, N (Numeric) - if your field will contain only numbers, L (Logical) - if your field will contain only Yes/No statements; you can also choose M (Memo) and D (Date) although you probably won't need it. The most useful value is the type V (Variable), which means that the field can contain character content of unlimited length.
3. Next enter the length of your fields in the Field length column. You can type in any positive number (although if the field is numeric it must not be more than 15 letters long). If you create a logical, date, memo or variable field you don't have to specify its length.
4. Finally enter the number of decimal places for numeric fields in the Field decimals column (do not enter anything here for other field types).

Field values can be edited, deleted, moved up and down by means of the Ctrl Up and Ctrl Down keys - just like during the regular Browse databases option. Some Assist options - like Append, Replace, Reform, Append from - are also available, which can be especially helpful when dealing with databases containing very many fields. Thus you can, e.g., append field structure from any other database (using the Append from) option, and then replace all "C" field types to "V" using the Replace or Reform options.

If you make any mistake, Star4Win will give you a warning and resume editing.

If afterwards you will wish to change the database structure, you may choose the File structure option of the File menu and do the necessary modifications.

Create special files

This menu option will help you create special files for glottochronological purposes. These files generally have a standard database structure, but have a restriction: names of languages as field names there should consist of three letters maximum. This is a restriction taken over from StarLing and we hope to overcome it soon.