Opening the same file twice

PRIMER 7 will allow the same file to be opened into the workspace more than once, since the response to the Open menu item is to create a copy of the file for entry to PRIMER at that time, and there is no physical link maintained from the workspace to the original file. Thus amendment of that external file cannot alter data entries in the workspace, and vice-versa (unless, of course, Save Data As is used to overwrite that file with one of the same name), so a second copy of the original file can be opened without difficulty. PRIMER 7 does, however, demand unique naming of all workspace items, so any second (and subsequent) attempts to open the same file will add a version number, e.g. Tasmania copepods(2). Similarly, default names for new windows generated automatically by an analysis sequence: Data1, Data2, …, Resem1, Resem2, …, Graph1, Graph2, … are unique, and if changed to more identifiable names, these too should be unique. Thus an attempt to give the name Tasmania nematodes to a similarity matrix as well as the data sheet will result in the name Tasmania nematodes(2) being assigned.