Getting ODBC Driver Help
You may be able to get some limited help for an ODBC driver by starting the DSN creation process through the ODBC Administrator and then clicking the Help button once a driver-specific dialog appears. This brings up the ODBC Microsoft Desktop Database Drivers Help file. However, this information is at best sketchy and often misleading. For instance, under the topic Connection Strings, the help file says that a connection string includes the following keywords:
DSN: Name of the data source
DBQ: Name of the directory
DRIVERID: An integer ID for the driver
FIL: File type
However, as we will see in the upcoming examples, the DBQ value is the name of the directory for the Microsoft Text Driver but not the name of the actual workbook for the Microsoft Excel Driver! The help file also does not give any indication as to when or whether these keywords are always required. Nevertheless, the information contained in the help file can be very useful.
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