yeah i found that just before you posted. it works great. I feel like I owe you a big one dude. Thanks for the tremendous advise

Aloha, I am attempting to extract graphics as described and discussed above for a friend with a database in Paradox 5. The examples above helped me tremendously and I'm making some progress but it doesn't seem to be working completely.

The table I have contains 4596 elements. The column with the graphics is a BLOB, and not every recorded contains an element.

When I run a script like the final one shown here (modified of course to my database), it extracts exactly 37 files and then stops. It is not the first 37 records, either. None of them has a graphic in the BLOB column, so I get 37 files of 0k.

I've used tc.home() to make sure TCursor is set to the first record. I've repaired the table and also have tried this on a different machine, same exact results. I've also used .isBlank() to have the script bypass empty records, but then I get no files exported.

Can anyone tell me what may be causing this script to export only those 37 records?

Mahalo (thanks) in advance.

in the scan, you don't want to know if the image var is blank, you want to know if the blob field is blank.. you've got it backwards.. should be:

if NOT tcHandle.Photograph.isblank() then

Thanks for this, Steve. Unfortunately it didn't fix the issue. Paradox runs a little longer, but still does not output any files. If I eliminate the if not statement, it still exports those 37 0k files which are empty, and then nothing.

I'm really curious as to why it is exporting those records. Based on the ID numbers given by the person who created the database they are all part of a similar group, perhaps all entered at the same time. The record immediately after this group does have a graphic in the BLOB field, perhaps Paradox is choking on that.

Thanks again, if you have any other thoughts of how to troubleshoot or fix this I'd be grateful.

have you attempted to view the contents of the blob fields and/or an old backup with the same contents?

you previously mentioned that you ran the repair tool on the table.. the repair tool does not touch the blob fields.. if they are damaged and/or not what you think they are, you have to determine that in a manner such as your current scan..

my guess is that the blob fields *are* damaged and/or not what you think they are.. the scan is doing what you told it to do.. unfortunately, you're on your own from that point..

Aloha and many thanks again, Steven. The BLOB field does contain graphics, and I have been able to view the ones I've looked at, so perhaps one/some of them are damaged and the script simply choking at that point.

I didn't realize the repair wouldn't work on the BLOBs. Good to know. I'll do a few more checks before giving up on this one. I appreciate your suggestions.

Keola

I had this same problem stated in the original post, and found a totally different solution to extracting large numbers of images (from lots of records) from a Paradox .mb file.

a) Open the table in Paradox.
b) Open a quick report.
c) Print to PDF (free utilities are available online for this)
d) Using a Mac, download File Juicer. (not available for PC apparently)
e) Run the printed PDF through File Juicer.

All images will be extracted from the PDF into individual .jpg files.

sdc.. obviously, this has limited functionality to most folks, but VERY cool idea!