# wlist command

The wlist BASIC program is a simulation
of the list command that additionally exploits
B-tree indexes.

For example:

```
list entity by name
```
In this example, only one attribute is specified. If there
happens to be an index defined on the attribute referenced by name,
the response is practically immediate, since it can retrieve the presorted
B-tree for the requested list. If it were to contain a more complex
expression, such as:

```
list entity by zip by name
```
Again, assuming that indexes are defined on both the zip
and name field, AQL processes the sentence as though the indexes were
not even there.

In some rare and peculiar cases, wlist may be faster than the list command.

In
addition, AQL does *not* use the indexes if any `^` or `[` and `]` characters are present
in the sentence.

## See also

- [list command](https://d3codex.com/access/list-command/)
- [wselect command](https://d3codex.com/tcl/wselect-command/)
- [wsort command](https://d3codex.com/tcl/wsort-command/)
- [wsselect command](https://d3codex.com/tcl/wsselect-command/)

---
Source: https://d3codex.com/tcl/wlist-command/ - part of the D3Codex reference.