At 01:27 a.m. 28/08/2013, Holcomb, Satin wrote:

>I work for a very large organization but have never used Firebird before. We have an office in Portugal that uses it with T&T Accounting Software. The user that used the program is no longer there and no other users are able to use it. The users cannot provide assistance because they speak very little English. I cannot seem to get the gsec utility to run.

First, I guess you need to understand that gsec is a tool that interfaces with the security database (security2.fdb). This database is the authentication gateway for managing user access the Firebird *server*. Nothing you can do with gsec will get you access to data in a user database. Although passwords are stored in security2.fdb, they are encrypted and cannot be retrieved, even by the system administrator.

>Version is 2.5.2.26540 and the machine OS is Windows 7 32bit Enterprise. Any step by step assistance you can give me would be greatly appreciated. I have followed many step by step instructions but everything says gsec is not recognized. So if you can start from "go to cmd.exe and type XYZ" it would be greatly appreciated.

A standard Firebird installation is deployed with a suite of command-line admin tools, including gsec. It is not at all uncommon for software vendors to deploy Firebird installations without some or all of these tools. Almost all of the functions provided by the tools are available to programmers through the Services API. Vendors will often (or usually) provide user-friendly ways for end-users to do selected admin tasks via their application programs.

You can obtain the tools by downloading the v.2.5.2 zip kit from the Firebird download site and extracting them from the \bin\ folder beneath Firebird's root. But you should first be clear about what you think you will achieve.

There are ways to get access to a *copy* of a user database that is located on a different machine running Firebird. Considering your lack of expertise, you would need to seek professional help with this. An authorisation agreement with the owners of the data would be required to attempt this kind of activity. I'm sure you can see how your scenario could otherwise be construed as an elaborate ploy to steal data.

Given that the package has been deployed with a relatively recent release of Firebird, it's a fair guess that it is still supported by the vendor. By far the best solution would be to consult directly with them for a solution to the problem.


Helen Borrie, Support Consultant, IBPhoenix (Pacific)
Author of "The Firebird Book" and "The Firebird Book Second Edition"
http://www.firebird-books.net
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