Question

I am trying to get some SQL server tables into FoxPro dbf.

I successfully managed to bcp export data such that when I use FoxPro Import Wizard, the data imports correctly. But when I try to do it at the command line, I can at best import the first few columns and all the other columns disappear.

In the following directory, I put both the .CSV file and the successful DBF import table.

directory with 2 files here

What I need to figure out is how to import these CSV files from the command line in FoxPro.

I tried various combinations of;

APPEND FROM D:\work\oh\output\sqloutput.csv TYPE CSV
APPEND FROM D:\work\oh\output\sqloutput.csv DELIMITED WITH TAB

None of it works.

Any ideas? I know I have done this before, I don’t remember what the trick was…

Answer 1

Wow.. I think you are going about it the wrong way… Just do a simple SQLCONNECT() to the SQL Database, run a query to the data source, stored procedure, or whatever and it’s in a cursor in VFP… Then, you can just “copy” to a DBF and you are done… Something like

lnH = SQLCONNECT()

(dialog pops up for you of ODBC connections).

if not that, you could do

lnH = SQLStringConnect("Provider=... for sql server, server name, etc")

Then

if lnH > 0
   sqlexec( lnH, "select * from someTableOnServer where whateverConditon", "C_LocalCursor" )

   select C_LocalCursor
   copy to PermanentTable

   sqldisconnect( lnH )
endif 

Now, if there are columns that are longer than 10 character column names, and you are NOT using a database container, you might have to adjust by either changing the query to GET the column names, or re-select the data once local to fit into 10 character non-dbc table context.

Another example to build out the query could be — for simplicity of readability while typing, I use text/endtext such as

text to lcSQLCmd noshow pretext 1+2
   select
         t1.Column1,
         t1.AVeryLongColumnName as AVLColName,
         t1.AnotherLongColumn2  as ALC2,
         t1.SomeFlag,
         t2.ColumnFromAnotherTable as CFATbl,
         t2.AnotherCol
      from
         SQLDatabase.dbo.SQLTable1 t1
            join SQLDatabase.dbo.SQLTable2 t2
               on t1.SomeKey = t2.SomeKey
      where
         t1.SomeCriteria = 'whatever'
      order by
         t1.SomeFlag
endtext

*/ Then, to "clean up" the string for VFP to pass properly, 
*/ strip out the cr/lf from the text such as
lcSQLCmd = chrtran( lcSQLCmd, chr(13)+chr(10), "" )

*/ THEN, pass this command through sqlexec()
sqlexec( lnH, lcSQLCmd, "C_LocalCursor" )

The second is obviously MUCH easier to read what you are trying to get, and notice I’ve also pre-shortened the long column names to VFP 10 char non-DBC column name limit. Then, just copy out like the first example.