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>I'm still amazed at how people never look inside the file. We're programmers. Doesn't anyone speak hex anymore? Whenever a funny looking file comes around, my first reaction is to try to open it. If there's nothing that will open it correctly, my next step is to look at it with a hex editor (actually, Ghisler's lister, bundled as the default viewer in TotalCommander - in the old times, I was using Vernon D Buerg's list.com from 1986). From there, it's sometimes possible to write a one-way conversion using a combination of filetostr(), string chopping, str2num and other binary-to-value functions which came up over the years.

I agree with you about needing to look inside the file. But I have been so busy lately I don't have time to "play around" with files. Converting from this .DBS (or whatever database it is) is not my job; that is, my customer does not pay me for it, yet. I was just doing preliminary investigation. And even if this .DBS file did have the content of the database (in some form) and I had to cut and paste from it to my VFP database, they would never pay for it. So it would be wasted time.

I used to be able to take time to research thing on my own, learn new programs, tricks, tips, etc. Not any more. I am in the process of upgrading a huge application from VFP backend to SQL Server (completely rewrite). I get tons of support calls every day from existing customers. And I have to spend a lot of time in sales activity. I don't remember when I stopped being able to have a luxury of just "playing around" with files and new programs. Sad reality.