>Cetin & Sergey,
>
>Thanks for your quick responses to my posting.
>
>I did not make this very clear. I have been experimenting on a WinME system to see what is and is not available on that version of Windows.
>
>When I create the UDL, in fact, most OLE DB data source types are available. Not VFPOLEDB, but I guess we knew that didn't get installed with MDAC.
>
>My confusion occurred when I tried creating a UDL file to use OLE DB for ODBC sources to connect to an Excel DB that I have, and then tried to use that UDL in Excel 2000. Appears that Excel 2000 doesn't know anything about UDL files.
>
>This was just a test to help me understand how UDL files might work in WinME and nothing that I actually ultimately intend to do. What I do intend is to have my C++ program running on this WinME system to use a UDL file to will link to a VFP DB. For that I will need to separately install the VFPOLEDB software.
>
>Again thanks for your advice.
>
>Jim

Jim,
Excel2000 knows UDL files - but its menus don't know that it knows:) Here is a message that I posted on another forum:

"Forget about ODBC, its capabilities are limited. You can use OLEDB with 2000 too but as I said manually it's harder and with 2000 as you said even menu option is missing. You closed the door to macro but anyway I'll write here if you want to try:
-Tools\Macros, say named getVFPData and Create
-Write macro body (here assuming it would put the data starting from active cell).

strCon = "OLEDB;Provider=VFPOLEDB;Data Source=" & _
"c:\my Path\mydatabase.dbc"
strSQL = "select * from myTable"

ActiveSheet.QueryTables.Add( _
Connection := strCon, Destination := ActiveCell, SQL := strSQL ).Refresh

-Save and close editor
-On desired cell, tools\macros, run getVFPdata."

Doing this via Excel automation is easier:)
PS: The "menu option" that doesn't exist in Excel2000 is "Import\Get external data\udl file" - sort of (I don't even have office on this box to see exact menu).

Cetin