DBF Viewer and Editor – DBF Commander Professional

DBF Commander Professional's interface is intended to be very simple and easy to use. You can see the Main Window below:

main dbf operations

 

Menus

DBF Commander Professional's Main Menu contains all commands (whose descriptions you can find in the respective topics).
The Toolbar consists of the most frequently used action buttons. If you hover the mouse cursor over a toolbar button, a hint will appear with detailed information about the command. The Toolbar is dockable; you can move or close it.

A newly opened DBF file's table will be put on a new table tab. Use the tabs to switch between tables. Right-click a tab to access its commands:

  • Close, Close All, Close All But This – these commands let you close the currently open tables.
  • Open Folder – this command opens the directory that contains the current DBF file.

At the bottom of the application's Main Window, you can find the Status Bar. It may contain the information listed below:

  • DBF Commander Professional's current status.
  • The application's global hints.
  • The results of the last executed SQL query.
  • Information about the status of the Caps Lock and Num Lock keys.

 

DBF Table Form

Since DBF Commander Professional is an MDI application, each DBF file opens in its own child form, which consists of the components described below.

Filter Records Panel

This panel is designed for filtering records by the specified conditions. For more information, see Tools -> Filter Records...

DBF Table Grid

Most of the Main Window's area is occupied with the Table Grid, which is intended for direct editing of a DBF file:

  • Use the Up, Down, Left, and Right arrow keys to move from cell to cell.
  • Use the Tab key to move from field to field. If the last column is reached, the selection will move to the first field of the next row.
  • Click the current cell (or press the Enter or F2 key) to put the text cursor into the cell.
  • Use the Delete key to clear the cell's value (if the text cursor is in the cell and the cell's value is highlighted).
  • Use the Cut, Copy, Paste, and other Edit commands when working with cells.
  • Ctrl+Up (Ctrl+PageUp) – moves the current cell selection to the top of the currently visible cells.
  • Ctrl+Down (Ctrl+PageDown) – moves the current cell selection to the bottom of the visible cells.
  • Ctrl+Left (Home) – moves the current cell selection to the first column.
  • Ctrl+Right (End) – moves the current cell selection to the last column.
  • Ctrl+Home – moves the current cell selection to the first row.
  • Ctrl+End – moves the current cell selection to the last row.
  • PageUp – moves by the number of currently visible rows toward the first record.
  • PageDown – moves by the number of currently visible rows toward the end of table.
  • Escape – cancels the last change in a cell and hides the current cell editor.

If the field value is NULL, the grid shows it as the NULL text. For more details about NULLs, see this topic: Set NULL.

You can click a column header to quickly sort the DBF file. The current DBF file will be ordered by the field. By default, the sort direction is ascending. If the current file is already sorted by that field, the sort order will be changed (e.g., from ascending to descending). For more information, see Tools -> Sorting.

You can drag-and-drop table columns. The positions of new columns are not saved to the current DBF file. To change the fields order permanently, please use the File Structure dialog box (Move Field Down/Up).

You can also right-click in the grid to invoke the Popup Menu, which contains the most frequently used Edit commands.

Status Bar

This bar consists of a few panels and contains the following information about the DBF file:

  • The DBF file's full path and name.
  • The current record's number and the total number of records, as well as the number of deleted records (if any).
  • The current field's number and the total number of fields.
  • The current field's type, width, and precision.
  • The DBF file's type: "Visual FoxPro" or "dBase III plus".
  • The DBF file's code page.

 

SQL Panel

The main feature of DBF Commander is SQL queries execution.

For more information about the SQL syntax, please refer to this topic: Using SQL queries

Command Line Interface

DBF Commander Professional supports the command line interface. For more details, please see this topic: Command Line.