Link Fox Pro DBF tables w/Access 2003

[Abe E.]

Hi,

I'm using Access 2003 and I'm trying to link to DBF
tables from Visual FoxPro. However, I get error
3274 "External table is not in the expected format". I
would really appreciate your help.

Thank you.

AE.

 

[Cindy Winegarden]

In [email protected],

I'm using Access 2003 and I'm trying to link to DBF
tables from Visual FoxPro. However, I get error
3274 "External table is not in the expected format". I
would really appreciate your help.

Hi Abe,

Over the years new features have been added to FoxPro table formats such as
an auto-incrementing data type and database events. You can not read tables
having these new features with ODBC - you have to use OLE DB. Do you know
much about the tables you're trying to work with? Are they part of a
database (a DBC file is present) or are they "free" tables?

 

[Abe E.]

Hi Cindy,

Thank you for your help. I don't know much about the
files since they are part of an administrative software
that I bought recently. All I know is that they are DBF's
with their corresponding CDX index files. I was able to
link them with Access 2000 but with Access 2003 I cannot.
The reason I want to be able to link them is because I'm
more familiar with Access and I want to create Access
Queries that I will later use from within excel to create
pivot tables. I'm using Windows XP Pro with Office 2003
Pro.

I'm sorry but I don't know if the tables are "free" or
wether a DBC (which I don't know what it means) is present.

Again, I thank you for your time and in trying to help
me.

Have a happy thanksgiving.

Abe.

 

[Cindy Winegarden]

In [email protected],

... they are DBF's
with their corresponding CDX index files. ...

I'm sorry but I don't know if the tables are "free" or
wether a DBC (which I don't know what it means) is present.

FoxPro tables have a DBF extention (MyTable.dbf) . If the table has a Memo
field then the details of the Memo are stored in an FPT file (MyTable.fpt).
If the table has indexes then there will be a MyTable.cdx present.

The Database Container table file, if present will be MyDatabase.dbc, it's
Memo will be MyDatabase.dbt, and it's index will be MyDatabase.dcx.

 

[Abe E.]

Cindy,

The tables DO have memo fields and I can see the .FPT
files, and I DON'T see any .DBC extensions. When I had
the problem with Access 2000 I remember reading article
307455 from the Microsoft Knowledge Base and it pointed me
in the right direction. However, with Access 2003 it is
not working.

If you know of another way that I can create queries
based on the foxpro tables and then be able to create
Excel pivot tables I would appreciate your input, as this
is the final goal.

Thank you.

 

[Cindy Winegarden]

In [email protected],

The tables DO have memo fields and I can see the .FPT
files, and I DON'T see any .DBC extensions. When I had
the problem with Access 2000 I remember reading article
307455 from the Microsoft Knowledge Base and it pointed me
in the right direction. However, with Access 2003 it is
not working.

If you know of another way that I can create queries
based on the foxpro tables and then be able to create
Excel pivot tables I would appreciate your input, as this
is the final goal.

Have you considered making your query directly in Excel?

 

[Abe E.]

Cindy,

Sorry for not replying before. I'm very frustrated
with this issue where I cannot open a DBF in Access
2003. I cannot open ANY of the DBF files in Access 2003
or Excel 2003. If you have any ideas on how to solve the
office ERROR 3274 "External table is not in the expected
format. (Error 3274)" I would appreciate your help.

Thank's again.

Abraham.

 

[Cindy Winegarden]

In [email protected],

Sorry for not replying before. I'm very frustrated
with this issue where I cannot open a DBF in Access
2003. I cannot open ANY of the DBF files in Access 2003
or Excel 2003. If you have any ideas on how to solve the
office ERROR 3274 "External table is not in the expected
format. (Error 3274)" I would appreciate your help.

Are you able to open the exact same table using Access 2000 or Excel 2000
and ODBC?

If not, you could have some sort of table corruption. Otherwise, the only
explanation is that the table is in a non-ODBC compatible format and has
some of the new VFP7/8 OLE DB-only features. In that case you would only be
able to read it via OLE DB, and changing to Access 2000 or Excel 2000
wouldn't make any difference.

 

[Abe E.]

Cindy,

I'm able to open the file in 2 machines:

Machine 1: Has Windows 98 and Office 2000 Pro (with
Access 2000) and I remember I had to download some sort
of program (I think BDE Engine or something) and it works.

Machine 2: Has Windows 2000 Professional and Office 2000
Pro (with Access 2000) and it works fine.

I don't really know what the problem is with Access
2003. I believe it is along the lines of the Jet Engine
and the Borland Engine (which I don't know much about).
I'm thinking about getting Visual Fox Pro 8 and work from
there.

Thank's again for your help.

Abraham.