Re: Informix file to ASCII file??

Dave wrote: > > our software vendor went under leaving us with 8 years of records on an informix based > system. The informix software is a ver4.1(runtime)Cisam. We need to convert the > tables/files with *.dat & *.idx to some type of ASCII file so we can use it with new > vendor. There appears to be several command line utilities like load and unload. Will > any of these work?? > > Thanks, > > Dave Rorick > Hillsboro Police > totalcell@conknet.com Sounds like a Standard Engine database since there are actual files that you can see in the file system. It doesn't really matter though, you need to go into "isql", if you have this - it was not supplied under all versions of SE (std. engine) and execute UNLOAD TO "filename" SELECT * FROM <table-name>. This will leave you with an ASCII file delimited with pipes. (one line per record, each field separated by pipes.) I am unaware of any command line utilities that do this (that doesn't mean they don't exist, though). If "isql" is not available to you, I have a wonderful utility called "olsql" (unfortunately it's on 1/4" tape, so I can't get to it easily, but I think Informix was the supplier of the original C-code (of which I do have the source, on the same tape...it has compiled under both NCR-unix and HP-UX, and since portability was a major concern, I would be very interested in why it might not compile under any other C-compiler (even a DOS one))). With this, you could do something similar and parse the resulting file with a customized C program (or if you're really good at sed, I suppose that's another possibility). - danwright@bigfoot.com