Soapbox on:

I agree with you and would take your advice when ORACLE and its Network Computer wipe out all other major players, ie IBM, SUN, SYBASE, etc.

I had a conversation with an Oracle rep about data warehousing. I asked about data other formats, ie VSAM and SAS datasets along with Oracle tables. His answer was to put 'everthing' into Oracle tables.

There are other RDMS.

If you use ODBC, or SAS Access it is painless to use your code withe any ODBC compliant system. There is even ODBC to flatfiles. Roger J DeAngelis CompuCraft Inc XLR82SAS@aol.com ( Accelerate to SAS ) http://members.aol.com/xlr82sas/utl.html