Creating a DLT from a Single FD/SL Pair

If you have COPY files containing FD and SELECT information, you can use the files to create a data layout file, regardless of whether or not the COPY files were created by AcuBench. The COPY file containing FD information must have an .fd extension and the COPY file containing the SELECT statement must have an .sl extension.

The .fd and .sl COPY files that you use can reside on any local or mapped drive. If you use COPY files that do not reside in the current project directory, when you generate your project (or the DLT), the newly regenerated COPY files are placed in their original location and will overwrite any files of the same name located in that directory. The DLT, however, is created in the directory specified in the New FD/SL interface (by default, the project's FD directory).

  1. Select New from the File menu and click the FD/SL tab or right-click the Project node in the Data view and select New FD/SL from the pop-up menu.
  2. Select the Import from Files icon to specify that you have already defined an FD and SELECT statement that will be used to create a new data layout file.
  3. Enter a name and location for the data layout file, as described in the previous procedure.
  4. Click OK.

    The Import FD/SL Files dialog box opens, asking you to specify the location of the .fd and .sl COPY files that you want to use to create the new data layout.

  5. Enter the path to the COPY files, or use the browse button to the right of the entry fields to navigate to the directory containing each COPY file.
  6. Click OK to create the data layout and open it in the File Designer. You can now make changes to the data layout file, if needed, as described in Working in the File Designer.
Tip: To change the name of an existing DLT, right-click the icon for the DLT in the Data view and click Properties. This can be especially useful for the import function, because you enter a name for the DLT before specifying your FD and SL COPY files. Note that changing the name of the DLT does not affect the name of the generated FD and SL files.