CA 2E Quick Tour › Defining Access Paths › Default Access Paths

Default Access Paths

CA 2E uses the relations in the data model to create a default set of access paths for each file. In many cases these will be sufficient. You may override the defaults or define additional access paths.

Three default access paths are automatically created for every file:

• A physical (PHY) access path (unkeyed). It contains the address of all data stored physically within a file and stored in the order in which the data was written to the file.
• An update (UPD) access path (logical view). It is used to update the file and contains all fields defined for the file. It cannot be altered.
• A retrieval (RTV) access path (logical view). It specifies a view of the data that CA 2E generated programs use to retrieve records from a file. Each file has at least one.