Exporting from unknown BTRIEVE file

[MarkButler]

I have application files that are in a BTRIEVE format (version unknown). The files were part of an application written in Micro Focus COBOL and meant to run in DOS or early Windows. There are no DDF files or other dictionary files that I can find. And yes the company is defunct and can't be reached.

I need to get the data out of these files into soemthing else that can be maintained. I can dump the files using a hex editor. I was wondering where I can get the definition of the physical BTRIEVE file structure. I was hoping to find out what file version I was dealing with. All of the generic utilities I have tried are not having any success accessing these files. The application is so old it will not run on anything I curently have. As a result I do not have BTRIEVE running anywhere.

If need be I will write a low level file access program to get the data out if I can find any documentation as to the BTRIEVE physical file layout. Any help or pointers would be appreciated.

TIA

 

[mirtheil]

AS far as the record sturcture, Btrieve does not store that information any where in the file. It stores the record as a collection of bytes. It might be possible to guess what the structure is by using the Btrieve Function Executor. You probably won't be able to use a hex editor to open the file as there is more to the file than just the data. You can download a trial version of the latest version of Btrieve (called Pervasive.SQL) from

http://www.pervasive.com.

That should be able to read the file because it's backward compatible with older file formats.

info@mirtheil.com
Custom VB and Btrieve development.
Certified Pervasive Developer
Certified Pervasive Technician

 

[grnelson]

If you need to try and create the DDF files you can check out BtSearch at

http://www.nssdd.com.

It will allow you to open the file and if you install the trial version of Pervasive V8 at

http://www.pervasive.com/downloads

then you should be able to run BtSearch to analyze the structure.



Gil

 

[jbutcher]

Most Likely it has a flat file equivalent.

you may be able to use butil -save to extract the records with their keys.

I can write a quick program to create a file with fixed length records for easy use in many languages.


What is the size of the file?

 

[MarkButler]

There are many files I am after. In looking at the raw data in a hex editor I think your approach will work. I do not know the physical layout of a BTrieve file but I am sure that there is a way to break the file into records and subsequently the records into fields.

If you are willing to work on this I can send you a file.

TIA

 

[jbutcher]

How do I give you my e-mail on this forum?

I can startout with a free-email?


lbasicuser@yahoo.com

once we are connected using this I will pass you my normal e-mail.