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FairCom ISAM for C

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FairCom DB ISAM Usage

Partitioned files are created with standard c-tree APIs. A partitioning conditional expression is defined with the PTADMIN Partition Administration API call and the ptADMINrule parameter. Specify an extended (Xtd8) ctPARTAUTO mode in the x8mode parameter of an extended file creation block. While partitioned files require an extended (Xtd8) header they do not have to be HUGE files unless the logical file size will exceed the 2GB/4GB limit.

A partition key is set when the file is created using the prtkey parameter of the extended file creation block. The default is 0 (the first key associated with the data file). Set this value to the relative key number for the desired index if the default is not appropriate for your application.

A partition file name is the base data file name with a 3-digit raw partition number as the file extension. Only automatic naming is available in this mode.

Note: Alternative file naming is possible with custom modifications to the ctpart.c module and recompiling your FairCom Database Engine.

By default, 16 bits of the 64-bit record offset reference the raw partition number, allowing each partitioned file to support up to 65,535 member files over its lifetime, thus also somewhat limiting overall file size (i.e., the more bits used for partition numbering, the smaller the overall size of the file can be). The maximum value is 32-bits (4,294,967,295 member files). This numbering vs. size tradeoff is set at file create time using the callparm parameter of the extended file creation block (Xtd8), where a value of 0 defaults to 16-bits. Values less than 4-bits default to 4-bits (maximum 15 member files).

Note: Default partition naming, partition rules, and maximum number of partitions are used by default when not defined by the Xtd8 extended parameter block and the PTADMIN API call.

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