Creating Select-lists

A number of INFO/ACCESS commands may be used to create select-lists. The two principal commands are SELECT and SSELECT. SELECT creates a select-list of the items that match the specified criteria; the item-IDs in the select-list are arranged in the order in which the items are currently stored in the file. SSELECT works the same way except that it sorts the item-IDs by the specified attribute. SELECT is thus analogous to LIST, and SSELECT to SORT.

The table below summarizes the INFO/ACCESS commands that create select-lists.

Command	Description
SELECT	Selects items that meet the specified criteria.
SSELECT	Selects and sorts items that meet the specified criteria.
SAMPLE	Selects a specified number of items that meet the specified criteria.
SSAMPLE	Selects and sorts a specified number of items that meet the specified criteria.
FIND	Selects items that contain the specified string.
QSELECT	Creates a select-list from data in the specified items rather than from their item-IDs.
FORM-LIST	A synonym for QSELECT.
NSELECT	Selects items that are in an active select-list but are not in the specified file.

Selection criteria may be included with all of these commands except for FIND, QSELECT, and NSELECT.

SELECT Syntax

The SELECT command uses standard INFO/ACCESS query syntax.

Format

SELECT [DICT] filename [item-list] [selection] [output]

Description

SSELECT uses the same syntax as SELECT and additionally allows the user to define one or more sort expressions. Without any sort expressions, SSELECT sorts the item-IDs in ascending order.

The following topics are presented in this section.

Creating a Select-list (SELECT)

Selecting Items that Contain a String (FIND)

Listing Items Not Included in a Select-list (NSELECT)

Creating a Select-list from Data (QSELECT)

Selecting a Specified Number of Items (SAMPLE)