FoxPro to C#: What best method between ODBC, OLE DB or another?

Question

We need to read data from FoxPro 8 with C#. I'm gonna do some operations, and will push some of thoses data to an SQL Server database. We are not sure what's best method to read those data.

I saw OLE DB and ODBC; what's best?

REQUIRMENTS:

The export program will run each night, but my company runs 24h a day.
The DBF could sometimes be huge.
We DON'T need to modify data.
Our system, wich use FoxPro, is quite unstable: I need to find a way that ABSOLUTELY do not corrupt data, and, ideally, do not lock DBF files while reading.
Speed is a minor requirement: it must be quick, but requirement #4 is most important.

+1 for still having to deal with FoxPro DBFs just like me :) — Tim B James

Alan B Alan B · Accepted Answer · 2012-09-25T15:32:35

I would use the OLEDB connector - it has been updated much more recently, is faster and handles memory better.

If you are just reading data from the DBF via the OLEDB driver, I wouldn't worry about locking at record or file level, or corrupting data. All you need to do is handle exceptions in your C# code, for example when some process in your FoxPro application has the DBF open exclusively and you can't read it.

You also need to be careful that any queries are optimised to use available indexes on the DBF file, especially since you mention that it's large.

I assume this is all on the same LAN? If it has to work across the internet then you need to investigate exposing the FoxPro data via a web service.

Finally, there are other options for accessing DBF files.

Sybase also provide ODBC and OLEDB drivers that can access DBF files - however they cannot use FoxPro triggers, stored procedures and so on. That almost certainly doesn't matter in your case, though.

FoxPro to C#: What best method between ODBC, OLE DB or another?

4 Answers