I think the only significance of 3 values per line is so it fits on an old 80-character green screen.

I have been investigating the code further and it seems the 1018 values can be broken up into 13 unequal groups, each group can be named GROUP0 ... GROUP12, as GROUP is another input value, however it was hidden from my view of the application, as the data retrieval part just gets the whole block, and leaves it up to the application to drill down into the group.

The following explanation of the structure is for information only. I only need to return an array of 1018 float values to the user application - but if it helps devise a better SQL storage method, then here goes: -

Of the 13 unequal groups, each group contains between 1 and 14 sub-groups of values and a sub-group can be between 2 and or 24 values

The first data line of each block (2nd actual line) contains some checking data, so actual data starts on data line 2 (actual line 3)

Example Group0 contains 14 sets of 12 values = 168 numbers

Data starts at position 4, and ends at position 172,

Then Group1 contains 10 sets of 6 values = 60 values

Data starts at position 173 and ends at position 232

I have worked out the start and end positions of each data group.

The number of values in a sub-group are pre-solved values of some mathematical transform formula on empiracle data (as far as I can tell this whole data table is like old-fashioned log tables -you just look up the values you want) the user calls it pcd or pcv ('positional calibration data/vector') I think I would need a degree in higher mathematics to fully understand what the data actually means.

So the full query is: query the positional calibration co-ordinates/vectors (x,y,z, vx,vy,vz) or (x,y, vx,vy) for the Nth transform of Group A, Block B, File C

However as I said earlier, I the application itself takes care of the co-ordiantes and the transform and the Group - I can get at the required Group if I want, but I still have to return an array of 1018 float values - all the non-required group values could be set to zero, only populating the required group.