Converting Microsoft Works databases.... *shudder*

[Ian Stephenson]

I have Works 8.0 and you can SAVE AS to dBase IV format.  Not sure for other 
versions.

Regards,
Ian


"Michael B. Trausch" <"mike$#at^&nospam!%trauschus"> wrote in message 
news:upednTjcPOxtwdbYnZ2dnUVZ_sydnZ2d at comcast.com...
>I was wondering if anyone has had any experience with this.  Someone I
> know is trying to move away from Microsoft Works, and I am trying to
> look into a solution that would convert their data in a lossless fashion
> to a more modern format.  The database has more than 65K rows, so
> converting it to be an Excel spreadsheet, would, AFAIK, not be an option.
>
> It would seem that MS Works can export the database as a DBF format
> database, though I have not tried it.  Before I get started, I was
> wondering if anyone has been through this problem in the past and used
> Python to solve the problem.  Knowing nearly nothing about the DBase
> family of application software, and database formats, I find myself
> feeling like the information out there is, frankly, a bit overwhelming.
>
> Would the recipe specified in the "dbf to csv" thread be useful here for
> a file in DBase IV format?  It of course uses the same extension, but I
> am not sure if the file semantics are at all similar.  The idea at the
> end would be to probably create a database on an small SQL server (like
> MySQL) and let the person access their data using ODBC on their Windows
> workstation so that they can create form letters and the like.  They do
> not have access to MS Office's Access product, nor do they wish to use
> OOo Base (and I can't say that I blame them -- it seems to crash far too
> often to be considered reliable stuff).
>
> -- Mike