qea/qeax file format

[avanzwol]

I discovered lately that since the introduction of qea files, someone at EA got to the luminous idea to write the qea filename into the repository.ConnectionString variable. Since my addin does a check on the connection string, I'm dragged into a new problem. I have to check the repository.ConnectionString if it is a real connectionstring or if it is a qea-filename. And if it is a (qea) filename, I have to parse the content of the qea file to get the connectionstring. But if I want to properly parse the qea file, then I need to know what the exact format is. I do not want my users will be confronted with another exception again, because I misinterpret the file. I haven't been able to find the definition of this qea file yet.

Of course I know the qea file is human readable and the first line looks like a connectionstring. But does a qea file ALWAYS look like this?

Can someone tell me where I can find the definition of the qea file format? Or is there already a qea-file parser in the EA library?

[Eve]

I discovered lately that since the introduction of qea files, someone at EA got to the luminous idea to write the qea filename into the repository.ConnectionString variable.

From what I can see it has always returned the path to the file.

Since my addin does a check on the connection string, I'm dragged into a new problem. I have to check the repository.ConnectionString if it is a real connectionstring or if it is a qea-filename. And if it is a (qea) filename, I have to parse the content of the qea file to get the connectionstring. But if I want to properly parse the qea file, then I need to know what the exact format is. I do not want my users will be confronted with another exception again, because I misinterpret the file. I haven't been able to find the definition of this qea file yet.

Of course I know the qea file is human readable and the first line looks like a connectionstring. But does a qea file ALWAYS look like this?

Oh, you're using a shortcut file. In that case the API behavior you're describing has been that way since version 7.

Can someone tell me where I can find the definition of the qea file format? Or is there already a qea-file parser in the EA library?

Read the first few bytes of the file. If it's a model it will start with the ASCII "SQLite format 3". If it's not that it will be the referenced human readable connection string.