# Migrating from a legacy Dbase app

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/migrating-from-a-legacy-dbase-app/62396>\
**Category:** Rails\
**Created:** [June 3, 2006, 11:39pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/migrating-from-a-legacy-dbase-app/62396 "2006-06-03T23:39:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![afg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@afg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/afg)\
**Post date:** [June 3, 2006, 11:39pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/migrating-from-a-legacy-dbase-app/62396/1 "2006-06-03T23:39:53Z")

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All,

My company uses Goldmine as its contact/sales opportunity manager.  
(Uses Dbase for it’s DB).

I’m trying to get a Rails app to implement the parts of it we actually  
use.

I’ve been building my Rails app in MySQL. Now I’m need to start  
getting data from Goldmine into my Rails app.

What’s the recommended approach?

A one time transfer of data? (Via what tool?)

Some kind of ongoing sync where data added to Goldmine (Dbase 4)  
automatically gets added to my Rails App?

If their is a book that covers this, a simple reference would be great.

## Thanks Greg

Greg F.  
The Norcross Group  
Forensics for the 21st Century

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**Author:** ![afg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@afg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/afg)\
**Post date:** [June 3, 2006, 11:46pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/migrating-from-a-legacy-dbase-app/62396/2 "2006-06-03T23:46:06Z")

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One-time transfer of data using Java/jdbc, DOM, and XSLT. A generic  
data transfer and manipulation tool takes about three days to write from  
scratch with this combination and runs as fast as any vendor’s data  
loading tool.

I can’t get more specific than this without violating my employment  
contract.

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**Author:** ![afg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@afg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/afg)\
**Post date:** [June 4, 2006, 12:50am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/migrating-from-a-legacy-dbase-app/62396/3 "2006-06-04T00:50:01Z")

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I also would do a one-time data transfer. It would be awesome if  
Goldmine had something like a export to CSV option; then you could just  
import it and transform it.

If you’re stuck hacking the legacy db all by yourself, see if someone  
else has written some sort of export tool. Failing that, you have to  
write a program to transform the data into some format that would make  
sense for your app.

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**Author:** ![afg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@afg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/afg)\
**Post date:** [June 4, 2006, 3:19am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/migrating-from-a-legacy-dbase-app/62396/4 "2006-06-04T03:19:22Z")

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navicat will import dbase to mysql

Jodi