ok this is why i asked bout the whole copying file stuff.. this is what i am tryin to do... i want to make a program that asks the user for their name like... john sammy smith... and what i want the program to do is check the first letter of the first middle and last name and if its not capatilized, then make it capitalized. im tryin to get this accomplished with the stuff i know, so all i really want to do is save the name to a file then check the data and write the new data over the existing information and cout the result. thx for everyones help.