UniVerse® is a dynamic and powerful platform supporting a bewildering range of real world business critical applications. At the heart of this platform lie a highly approachable metadata-driven enquiry language and a flexible three dimensional data model. This volume, the first in a three part series of self paced training courses covering the UniVerse® platform, uncovers that data model, allowing the student to discover and make the best use of the information held in their UniVerse systems and acts as a foundation for the other guides in this series. The book covers the fundamental structures of the UniVerse database, the use of files and dictionaries, how to find and present information, sorting and searching, grouping and summary operations, report formatting and complex calculations through creating expressions.