quickest i/o routine to process hundreds of ascii files

[Lawnmowerman]

I need to know the quickest way to read many (up to 3,000) smaller files (usually below 500 K) into memory. Right now I am reading them in one line at a time. I tried using input for the len of the file, but that did not help.

Is there some way to make vb not do this sequentially - could I write something in C++ and call it from vb . . . anything please

[Iain17]

There are many ways indeed to acomplish what you want to do. A COM object written in C++, would indeed be a very good way to do it. All you then need to do is to refernce the dll from your VB project and code away.

Other than that, i would have said the Input function, and the Get function. I usually find that the Get function is quicker on smaller files, while the Input function is quicker on larger files.

Private Sub inputMethod(strFile As String)
    Dim strText As String
    
    Open strFile For Input As #1
    'get the whole file.
    strText = Input(LOF(1), #1)
    Close #1
    
End Sub

Private Sub getMethod(strFile As String)
    Dim bTemp As String
    Dim strText As String
    
    Open strFile For Binary As #1
    'redim the byte array to the size of the file
    ReDim bTemp(LOF(1) - 1) As Byte
    'get the file in binary
    Get #1, , bTemp
    Close #1
    'convert the byte array to a string
    strText = StrConv(bTemp, vbUnicode)
    
End Sub

Personally I would use the FileSystemObject. It allows you to open the file as a single string in one operation.