How to fix DBF Error: “Couldn't find database”

Published by Jacob Martin on August 5, 2015

When you attempt to open an Approach file you might get the following error. Couldn’t find database “X:\…\DATABASE.DBF”. Do you want to replace its use with another database? The name associated with the database of .APR file is represented by “X:\…\DATABASE.DBF” which you might be trying to open it.

This error generally occurs when the Approach is unable to locate the files associated with .APR file for one or more database (.DBF). This generally happen when the database files has been moved to another directory, renamed, deleted, or changed to another file format, then in this case you can only read it, In this case you cannot access the drive where the database reside on, or it might have been damaged severely.

So in order to fix this problem, all .DBF files which are associated with this .APR has to be located. After the location of the file is identified then .DBF file has to be navigated to the new location by either returning them to its original locations or by mapping the .APR to the new location, this is only possible by answering yes to the question in the error message. Now the actual location of the files would get listed in the error message. In addition to it, you have to check under the file properties that the .DBF files have not been set to “Read only” and you would get the correct permission as well as access that location. If all .DBF files have the correct name and are located in the correct directory then in this case either the files may get damaged or corrupted. In order to determine whether the data is valid or not, you can try to open the .DBF file directly without opening the .APR. The steps are mentioned below:

Opening a .DBF File

Without opening its associated .APR you can open a .DBF file directly

1. Choose Open from the File menu.
2. Choose “dBASE IV (*.DBF)” from the “Files of type” drop-down list.
3. Navigate to the appropriate database file with a .DBF extension instead of.APR file and then click on Open.

Now the database would be opened in “Generic” .APR file which would be in the form of   “Blank Database” and worksheet. The changes that you make in the data it would be directly saved to the database. You would be asked whether you want to save it in the .APR on closing the file. It is recommended not to save this generic .APR the original file may be overwritten.

If by performing the above mentioned steps you are unable to edit the .DBF file, then it can be fixed by using DBF File Repair Tool. It is very professional, powerful and effective software as it can easily recover the corrupt database file without damaging the data. You can install dbf repair tool in order to recover your database file easily, if you are unable to access the database file then you can install dbf repair tool and recover your database file easily. This tool can also recover all components that included in a dbf file like data types, table name, and column name of all columns, Binary indexes, regular key, foreign key, unique key, Indexes, primary key, and candidate key.

Steps to use DBF File Repair Tool:

Step 1: Download, Install and Run DBF File Repair software.

Step 2: Then you need to select database application and database file to repair and then click on the ‘Start Scan’ button to start the scanning process.

Step 3: Then scanning process is in progress, if you want to stop it then click on ‘Stop’ button.

Step 4: Then you need to select the destination path by clicking brows button from dialogue box. And press ‘OK’ button.

Step 5: Then you need to select the database by clicking ‘Brows’ button in which you want to save the recovered data of DBF file. And click on ‘Finish’ button.

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