Hi Joe,

Joe Martinez wrote:

> I'm working on adding a backup command to my application, and as far as
> I know, the only way to do so is to make a call to the command like
> utility GBAK. I'm not too wild about this, but I guess I don't have
> much other choice. It would be great if IB/FB (and in turn IBObjects)
> had a backup API/component.

(see below)

> Anyway, here's my immediate problem:
> How does my application know where to find GBAK.EXE? It doesn't have
> any knowledge of where it is, and the Firebird Bin directory isn't
> automatically added to the system path when FB is installed, so it's
> necessary to specify the exact path to call it. How have others done
> it?

if the server is running on your local machine, you can read out the
path to GBAK.exe from

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\FirebirdSQL\Firebird\CurrentVersion
(ServerDirectory)

for Firebird and/or

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\InterBase Corp\InterBase\CurrentVersion

for IB (5.6, don't know whether they changed that in 6.0/6.5) from the
registry.

> Any other tips/pointers/cautions about doing this?

There is the Services API - more competent people on this list can give
you more deatils on that... ;-)

> Thanks,
> Joe

hth,
fingerman
(and btw welcome aboard the IBO community! you won't regret it...)