In this example, the string contains the entire file contents. Perhaps waiting on the error and then managing the specific error (overload?) would be better? I'm thinking that if an error occurs, new temporary file(s) could be created in an orderly direction using copyfile, a copy of the string (as it existed before the error) could be copied to the new file, and the string could be reset to vbnullstring. This followed by a return to program code from the error code. Is this only half baked or is it worth kicking around? Dave