Answer
ArcIMS inherits the following limitations of .DBF files when reading or querying shapefiles or when creating shapefiles using the extract server.
· Only the first 10 characters in an attribute field name are recognized for dbf files. When exporting data to shapefiles from another data source, some of the unique field names which are longer than 10 characters may become duplicates if the first 10 characters are not unique. Those shapefiles with duplicate names will not be recognized by ArcIMS.
· Depending on the dBase format, there is an upper limit for the number of fields that can be stored in a single dbf file.
DBF 2 (dBASE II): 32
DBF 3 (dBASE III): 128
DBF 4 (dBASE IV): 255
· The maximum size of a string (or text) field in a .DBF file is 254.
· The maximum size of an integer or floating point field in a dbf file is 20.