When working with large amounts of data, it is often convenient to write data to or read data from a file. The Open statement lets you create and access files directly. Open provides three types of file access:
- Sequential access (Input, Output, and Append modes) is used for writing text files, such as error logs and reports.
- Random access (Random mode) is used to read and write data to a file without closing it. Random access files keep data in records, which makes it easy to locate information quickly.
- Binary access (Binary mode) is used to read or write to any byte position in a file, such as storing or displaying a bitmap image.
Tips
The Open statement should not be used to open an application's own file types. For example, don't use Open to open a Word document, a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, or a Microsoft Access database. Doing so will cause loss of file integrity and file corruption.
The following table shows the statements typically used when writing data to and reading data from files.
| Access type | Writing data | Reading data |
|---|---|---|
| Sequential | Print #, Write # | Input # |
| Random | Put | Get |
| Binary | Put | Get |