Password Problem

[Mike Schwartz-PC Support & Services]

> processing password.  Sometimes, I can use vi to remove the password, I
> can actually read the processing table and know where the password is.
> Other times, the whole file is unreadable (just a bunch of characters)
> so I don't know which is the password.  If it somehow acquired a site
> password, wouldn't all of the tables have a password on them?
> 
> Vicky Prigg

	I believe only tables that were modified during the time a site
password was in place (or the default fppath was different) would have
gotten a different password.

	Site passwords can be a dangerous thing.  I have seen cases where
the site password accidentally got set to some string of characters while
somebody was modifying a few tables, and then later, when the person logged
off, several tables ended up with a password on them that nobody knew.
Perhaps you can see some pattern as to which tables got modified in order to
figure out who did this.  (I won't mention who did this to some of my
programs, because it happened over 20 years ago, when we were all new to
filePro.  But let me just say that right this minute I could reach around
behind me and grab the culprit by the scruff of my neck, if I chose to do
so...<grin>)

	It looks like you already know how to use vi to remove passwords in
processing tables that are saved in ascii.  For those tables that are not
saved in ascii, the only way that I know of to get the passwords removed is
to have fPtech do it for you.

	IMPORTANT:  In the future, you should make sure that ABE is set to
ASCII in your configuration, so that your processing tables all get saved in
a human readable form, where you can use vi to remove the passwords if that
ever becomes necessary.  

	If you do find it necessary to send tables out to branch offices in
non-human readable form, then I suggest setting yourself up a separate
development system where you can keep all the tables in human readable form,
then compile them with quickstart before you send them out.

	(I'm not exactly certain which verb to use with Quickstart.  Should
it be tokenize or compile or something else?)