Accessing third party applications????

[Dino]

LS

Is it possible to find out in what way a third party application is processing its data
for instance:
It uses a database to handle name, adress, zip, etc. and I want my app to use the same
information in that database and add extra info to it.
Now I can't access it directly, so is it possible to access it "trough" this third party app
or is there an other way to access this database?

- D -

If the database is a commercial one (eg. Access, SQL Server etc.) and is not encrypted, then you're in like Flynn - just talk to it the normal way you do with databases.

If it's encrypted, or is a proprietray format, then you have a copuple of choices.

You can try to hack the database files, which is often easy at the start, but can do major damage if it has indexing and triggers set up;

You can use send keys to talk with the application (which is really, really ugly, but does work

You can hook the widnwos on the app and talk to them using the VBThunder classes

Or, ideally, if the application has an external object model like Word or Access, then you can hook inot the and talk to the application that way.

any way you go, I think you might have difficulties. Companies don't like making their applications externally accessable, often for good reasons. Trial and error is the only way.

- gaffa