Hello all,

I'm very new to both btrieve and pervasive. I'm somewhat unsure if
what I'm doing is correct, so any help would be greatly appreciated,
I'm finding the documentation somewhat lacking for people never using
either product. Links to good tutorials, examples, anything would be
very helpful right now.

My end result is to pull the information from the Btrieve data into
Access XP.

I have a directory of .DAT files with three .DDF files (Index, Field,
and File). I don't know the significance of any of those beyond
assuming the .dat are data files while the .ddf are data definition
files. From what I garner, I should be creating a database through
the pervasive control center, and then attaching through access by way
of DSN.

ok, well i've <*kinda*> done that, but with somewhat inconsistent
results. I have run the new table wizard (selecting advanced
settings) and pointed to various .DAT files. sometimes the table is
created, sometimes not. each time the table is created, all of the
columns are unnamed_X, no data, even though the .DAT files contain
records.

i've seen postings saying some of things I'm seeing are from bad DDF
files, but how do you know they are bad? I've replaced the ones I
have direct from the CD, with the same results. They show in the
control center with red checkmarks. Is that normal?

I've tried the pervasive site, but haven't really found anything that
tells me what i'm doing wrong. I've read through various posts on
google, but really haven't found one that tells me what i'm missing.

thanks for your help.

-scott

To start with the DDF files are the dictionary files which are
required to use any 3-rd party software. If you need to export data
you might take a look at BtSearch at www.nssdd.com. It allows you to
export to dbase or ascii which can then be imported into about
anything. If your DDF files are not correct then you will not be able
to view your data correctly. But if you have DDF files from the
vendor then it should be ok.

Gil


shammer125 (AT) hotmail (DOT) com (Scott) wrote in message news:<f1a31f2.0401251659.4fab9ec2 (AT) posting (DOT) google.com>...

The red check marks are normal. It just indicates that those are
"system tables" and not an actual part of the database.

Whether the match what is provided from the vendor is a different
question than whether they are proper for the data.

For a high level check you should right-click the database and select
Check Database. Add all the tables to the side to check.
Hopefully the failed tab will be empty and the passed tab will contain
a list of all the tables. That unfortunately is not very common.
Also keep in mind that the check database only has limitted
information to check the SQL Schema (DDF files) against the data
files. The only information from the data files the engine has is
record length and data types for those portions of the record that
fall on a key. It does not guarantee that all of the columns are
defined as the correct type.

There are 3rd party tools that can help with creating and maintaining
DDFs. In the best case the vendor provides a valid set. Next best is
knowing the record layout and issuing a "create table" statement using
the "in dictionary" clause to create the table with the correct
deffinition.

Leonard

On 25 Jan 2004 16:59:45 -0800, shammer125 (AT) hotmail (DOT) com (Scott) wrote: