--- In firebird-support@yahoogroups.com, "johnecarey1"
<johnecarey1@...> wrote:

>
> Hello,
>
> We have software we use to keep a database of customer information and
> transactions. We want a certain amount of information about each
> transaction, which is definitely stored in the database, but the
> software does not support this feature. Essentially, we need customer
> names, dates and transaction amount. Our software does not support
> exporting this information to a usable form for us.
>
> The software uses a firebird database.
>
> Is there any way for us to access the information in our database
> outside of the main application that uses it?

Presuming you are using Windows (mentioning your OS helps):

If the software uses the embedded library, then the answer is 'only
while that application is not running'. If it uses the full server,
then yes. If you see fbserver.exe or fb_inet_server.exe in the
processes list, you have a full server installed.

It then depends on whether you want a 'once off' data extraction or
something a bit more frequent.

> Can anyone point me in
> the direction of getting this data? I have some experience programming
> with SQL databases, but not a ton.
>

Name your poison, er, language.

Firebird has connectivity options for C/C++, JDBC, .NET, ODBC, Delphi,
PHP, Python, Perl, OLEDB. I am sure at least one of those is useful
for you.

If you just want to browse around the database, go to the Firebirdsql
website and download one of the admin tools, which links here:
http://www.ibphoenix.com/main.nfs?a=ibphoenix&page=ibp_admin_tools

Many of these tools allow you to run SQL statements and save output to
CSV (which may be all you want).

Otherwise, as Alan suggested, you can install the ODBC driver. I have
used Excel (2003, but probably any version) before to import data from
a query.

Adam