Visual FoxPro 9.0 writing to FoxPro 2.6 tables

I'm trying to get an older Bill of Materials system to export parts to a Accounting system so that I can eliminate some redundancies in paperwork for an office. Both are written in FoxPro 2.6 for Windows. I have a copy of Visual FoxPro 9.0. I know I can read from the table in Visual FoxPro 9.0 without a problem. Can I write to the older 2.6a table without harming them in VFP 9.0? I originally tried to implement this in java but in my research, it seems 开发者_开发百科like writing it natively in VFP would be easier. Any insight into this would be much appreciated. Also I know this is an ancient system I am trying to update but, it is a quick fix for now. Later there will be much more sweeping upgrades to the systems.

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To add a little more detail to Stuart's answer, you can modify the data in the table without changing its format to the newer VFP9 format. However, there are some operations that will change its format, including adding null support, adding a field of one of the new field types, or adding the table to a database. As long as you stay away from such commands, you shouldn't have any problems.

The VFP9 Help topic "Table File Structure (.dbc, .dbf, .frx, .lbx, .mnx, .pjx, .scx, .vcx)" has a lot of info about the

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Yes, FoxPro is backwardly compatible so you can write to the older tables. If you need to make a copy you need to specify the type:

COPY TO c:\mytable.dbf TYPE FOX2X

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It may be relevant to know that not all data types were available in the Fox2x format; These field types will be remapped.

In FoxPro2.x the following common types do not exist and are changed:

Datetime -> Date
Integer  -> Numeric(11)
VarChar  -> Memo