The USE GROUP directive assigns a group of items to a single column in the table. The default data type for the resultant dataset in the database column is alphanumeric (CHAR (n), where n=1-max column length). The directive may be combined with other directives if the data is stored as a different type (DATE, NUMERIC). Combining fields into groups improves processing speed on the database, so effort is made to determine which fields can be combined.

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By adding the USE GROUP directive, the data is stored as a single numeric field where the column name is code-key.

The USE GROUP directive can be combined with other directives. The fields are mapped into a single DATE type data column in the database.