Forum Home
Press F1
 
Thread ID: 140345 2015-09-27 20:42:00 FoxPro v1.02 database problem following computer crash? arenawarper (17406) Press F1
Post ID Timestamp Content User
1409042 2015-09-27 20:42:00 I have a twenty-year-old British CRM program called ProAction which I use daily and do not want to give up as it continues to be very useful indeed. It uses FoxPro version 1.02 and runs on a Windows XP SP3 desktop. (My "other car"
is a Windows 8 64-bit laptop, BTW, which is why I can't use ProAction on the more modern OS.)
As you will have guessed, the program is no longer supported so I am asking for your advice on how to recover database files following the XP computer's crash.
What has happened and what I have done about it is as follows:
1. On loading the program, I got a "Not a database" error message.
This had also happened many years ago, and I was given verbal support and told to use one of the files which come with the program, and it worked. Now, having stupidly lost my notes (if I ever made any), I took a guess and used FOXFIX.EXE which seemed the obvious one. This simply opens a command screen which asks if I want to overwrite FOXFIX.001. Whether you answer yes or no, nothing happens.
2. I bought DBF Recovery Toolbox and ran it.
It "recovered" a number of *.dbf files (but not others). I renamed the old *.dbf files and replaced them with the new ones.
Now, on starting the program I get "Record is not in index" message. If you continue,
"Database is not indexed. Cancel/Ignore" comes up.
If you choose "Ignore", the message says "Error 26 in program ON..." [new line] "Database is not indexed." (twice). "Details have been recorded."
3. For info, the "obvious" FoxPro files which came with the program are:
FOX.FIX.001
FOXFIX.EXE
FOXFIX.FIP
FOXFIX.FXP
FOXHELP.DBF
FOXLAN.BAT
FOXPRORT.OVL
FOXPRORT.RSC
Please forgive the length of this message but I hope it gives you - who has so kindly read this far - as clear an idea of what the situation is as possible. Do please let me know if you need more info.
What would be your suggestion, please, (apart from getting a new program, of course, which would mean a huge loss of data)? Can I use any of the files listed above, for example?
I need hardly say that any advice would be very gratefully received.
arenawarper (17406)
1409043 2015-09-27 21:29:00 I take it you dont do backups? Maybe you should look into that for future disasters.

Out of those files, foxfix looks like the obvious, but what i would try is find an alternative program that could read your database and see what you could recover it and may need to rebuild it.

You could look at running your CRM on a newer OS by emulating an older OS or virtually running the OS inside your newer one to at least get it shifted over if needed. Although depending on your CRM there are plenty of free/open source ones available that you could shift your data to if you do manage to recover it.

Not much I can help with as I do not know ProAction or FoxPro.

Cheers,

KK
Kame (312)
1409044 2015-09-27 22:58:00 This may be of no help & may be the very reason you are posting here, but do you know anyone else who uses the same program, who may have more knowledge about it. Driftwood (5551)
1409045 2015-09-27 23:06:00 This may be of no help & may be the very reason you are posting here, but do you know anyone else who uses the same program, who may have more knowledge about it.

Before you go any further, backup everything. The program, the databases.
You might be doing more harm than good by running some 3rd party tools across it.

Also, given the age of the PC, dont assume that the hard drive is still good, the hard drive might have bad sectors/read issues, which could cause you issues.

This may be of some help
stackoverflow.com
1101 (13337)
1409046 2015-09-28 09:13:00 No reply to the question, but you could not have had important data for twenty years and not backed up? Could you?
The two last files "FOXPRORT" would be Foxpro runtime files for your applications ".exe" file, presumably not the FOXFIX but some other EXE identified by however you start the program.

The data files are suffixed *.dbf
Memo files if they are used are suffixed *.fpt
Index files end in *.cdx
The index files should be able to be rebuilt by the program unless it was written by an idiot

It may be that a memo file (fpt) is corrupted. It would need the development version of Foxpro to fix it - and no I don't have it. You may even have it on your machine.
Do you think you have anything like described above on your PC?
Perhaps the 20 years old is a bit conservative too?

Why can I remember all this stuff, I was trying to forget it!!!
Ofthesea (14129)
1409047 2015-09-29 08:12:00 Checking back ..
Foxpro 1.0 is dated 1989
Foxpro 2.0 is 1991

If you have dbf files without matching fpt files (which is quite possible) then you should be able to open the dbf with Excel.
Ofthesea (14129)
1409048 2015-09-29 20:27:00 I just Googled FoxPro and the first response was called "End of Life" trying to sell you a conversion. It said "Does Visual FoxPro's end-of-life mean the end of
your software applications built on it?" and asked you to call them. onlinefilerepair.com
www.computing.net
annushkagoldsmen (17407)
1409049 2015-09-30 10:05:00 I think I can still detect a pulse Ofthesea (14129)
1