Converting forms from Visual dBase 5.5 to Access 2002

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TJ

Has anyone tried to move forms and information from
Visual dBase 5.5 to Access? How difficult can I expect
this process to be and is there any migration tools?

Thanks
 
I not aware of any tools. You can certainly move the data, but salvaging any
of the program logic is going to be difficult.
 
Has anyone tried to move forms and information from
Visual dBase 5.5 to Access? How difficult can I expect
this process to be and is there any migration tools?
Click to expand...

Moving the data is easy - use File... Get External Data... Link or
File... Get External Data... Import.

Translating the forms is probably completely impossible. They simply
are different kinds of objects, with utterly different groundrules and
preconceptions. You'll need to just rebuild the forms.

You will probably also want to carefully consider the normalization of
your tables - Access tends to be more fully relational than the
typical dBase application.
 
-----Original Message-----


Moving the data is easy - use File... Get External Data... Link or
File... Get External Data... Import.

Translating the forms is probably completely impossible. They simply
are different kinds of objects, with utterly different groundrules and
preconceptions. You'll need to just rebuild the forms.

You will probably also want to carefully consider the normalization of
your tables - Access tends to be more fully relational than the
typical dBase application.


.
Click to expand...
Do you know if there any sort of Language dictionary for
equalivancies from dBase to Access. Example:
dBase's "Append Blank" = Access's what

Thanks for the help
 
Do you know if there any sort of Language dictionary for
equalivancies from dBase to Access. Example:
dBase's "Append Blank" = Access's what
Click to expand...

It's not that simple.

A dBase Form requires programming. An Access form does not (though you
can certainly enhance it with programming). dBase (as I understand it)
often uses code to add or alter data in tables; Access preferentially
uses Queries.

Trying to map dBase expressions to Access code would be like a literal
word for word translation of (say) Li Po's Chinese poetry into
English; it simply wouldn't make sense. It's not that the words are
different; it's that the whole context is different.
 
Do you know if there any sort of Language dictionary for
equalivancies from dBase to Access. Example:
dBase's "Append Blank" = Access's what
Click to expand...

Append blank has no exact equivalent in Access. If it does the same thing
that it did in dBase II (the CP/M version which is when I abandoned dBase
for better programs) then the best advice I can give is to save the data,
keep printed copies of the forms and reports along with what is supposed to
happen and start over.
DON'T try to do things the way you did before, learn the Access way.

Chances are most of what was done in code in dBase will be done in form
design in Access.
 
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