The Data Set Designer allows you to identify a set of data files to be used by a program (data sets are associated with programs).
Before a data set can be defined, the data files themselves must be defined using the File Designer. When you create a data
set, you select from the set of data layout files that are associated with the project.
There are four benefits to creating data sets for your program:
- The components of each data set are made visible to the Screen and Report Designers. This means that when you want to specify
a data item in a control variable, you can select a data file field name from the list of program variables (under the name
of the data set).
- When you generate code, AcuBench generates a set of standard file handling paragraphs for each data set. These paragraphs
include OPEN, READ, WRITE, and REWRITE.
- Via the Event tab of the Data Set Designer's Property window, you can launch the Event Editor to develop BEFORE and AFTER
procedures for the data set's associated OPEN, READ, WRITE, and REWRITE routines.
- You can create associations between fields in data sets such that the field of one data set is marked as related to a field
in a second data set. When you do this and generate code for the program, a standard reference routine is generated that performs a MOVE of the value of the first data item into the referenced (second) data item.
The following sections describe some basic Data Set Designer operations.