Maintenance Utilities Overview

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Pervasive.SQL provides both an interactive Maintenance utility and a command-line Maintenance utility. Both Maintenance utilities perform the following common file and data manipulations:

• Create new data files based on file and key specifications you define.
• Provide file and key specifications for existing data files.
• Set and clear owner names for data files.
• Create and drop indexes on data files.
• Import and export ASCII sequential data.
• Copy data between Pervasive.SQL data files.
• Recover changes made to a file between the time of the last backup and a system failure.

While both utilities provide the same core functionality, minor differences exist. For example, the interactive Maintenance utility allows you to create description files based on file and key specifications you define. The command-line Maintenance utility allows you to start and stop continuous operation on a file or set of files locally on the server.

Before you use either Maintenance utility, you should be familiar with Btrieve fundamentals, such as files, records, keys, and segments. For information about these topics, refer to the Pervasive.SQL Programmer's Guide.

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Note
The Pervasive.SQL product provides two categories of maintenance utilities: Btrieve and SQL. The SQL Maintenance Utility supports data source names (DSNs), which are used for relational access through ODBC. See Backing Up a Database with SQLUTIL for a discussion of the SQL Maintenance Utility.

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