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<< Click to Display Table of Contents >> Navigation: User Guide > Data > Handling data > Opening data files |
When a data file is opened the program:
•Checks the structure (serial and card) and collates the serial numbers
•Calculates all the filters and variables and checks all the question data
•Reject responses are added where appropriate
Data opening is done with the Data read user control which is usually in a Open data file.
These give a variety of methods for finding the file you need:
•The last accessed data file is displayed and can be opened immediately
•You can browse for the file
•You can access a list of previously opened data files in this session, this list also contains all the data files in the project folder
•You can prepare a new data file by combining and filtering existing files
•You can optionally include any verbatim file data
•You can create a brand new data file
Whenever a data file is read, a copy of it is held in memory. If you need to access the same file again the program will use the copy in memory rather than reading the raw data file again.
IMPORTANT: If you access a large data file and you will not need access it again you can use [Data] [Free data resources] to clear this memory.
The program locks changed data files to prevent two users attempting to alter the same file at the same time.
When you first attempt to update a file, the file date is checked and you may be asked to reload it if another user has changed it since you started looking at it.
IMPORTANT: a changed data file remains locked to other users until it is saved.