OleDB not supported in 64bit mode?

Question

I've been using Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0 and Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0 to read in .csv, .xls, and .xlsx files.

I just found out that neither of these technologies are supported in native 64bit mode!

I have 2 questions:

1. What is the supported way to programatically read .csv, .xls, and .xlsx files in 64 bit mode. I just can't find answers to this anywhere.

2. If I can't read in all three file types, what is the best way to read in .csv files in a 64 bit environment?

Notes:

• I'm using .NET (3.5p1)
• This is a shrink wrap app; redistribution is a key factor.

Update:

I can use CorFlags to force the application to run in 32bit mode, which works, but is not desirable.

Answer 1

Here is a discussion of what to do about deprecated MDAC. I am afraid the answer is not very satisfying ...

These new or converted Jet applications can continue to use Jet with the intention of using Microsoft Office 2003 and earlier files (.mdb and .xls) for non-primary data storage. However, for these applications, you should plan to migrate from Jet to the 2007 Office System Driver. You can download the 2007 Office System Driver, which allows you to read from and write to pre-existing files in either Office 2003 (.mdb and .xls) or the Office 2007 (*.accdb, *.xlsm, *.xlsx and *.xlsb) file formats. IMPORTANT Please read the 2007 Office System End User License Agreement for specific usage limitations.

Note: SQL Server applications can also access the 2007 Office System, and earlier, files from SQL Server heterogeneous data connectivity and Integrations Services capabilities as well, via the 2007 Office System Driver. Additionally, 64-bit SQL Server applications can access to 32-bit Jet and 2007 Office System files by using 32-bit SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) on 64-bit Windows.

Answer 2

The main problem is that the Jet DBMS is a 32bit library that gets loaded into the calling process, so you will never be able to use Jet directly from within your app in 64bit mode. As Tim mentioned you could write your own csv parser, but since this is a shrink-wrap app you want something that will handle a wider range of formats. Luckily, there are a number of ways to talk 32-bit apps, so you can still use Jet with a trick.

I would write a little exe that was marked to run only in 32-bit mode. This exe would take a command line argument of the name of the file to read and the name of a temp file to write to. I would use Jet to load the csv/xls, then put the data into an array of arrays, and use the xml serializer to write the data to the temp file.

Then when I need to load/convert a csv/xls file, I would do the following:

object[][] ConvertFile(string csvOrXlsFile)
{
    var output = System.IO.Path.GetTempFileName();
    try
    {
        var startinfo = new System.Diagnostics.ProcessStartInfo("convert.exe",
            string.Format("\"{0}\" \"{1}\"", csvOrXlsFile, output));

        System.Diagnostics.Process proc = new System.Diagnostics.Process();
        proc.StartInfo = startinfo;

        proc.Start();
        proc.WaitForExit();

        var serializer = new System.Xml.Serialization.XmlSerializer(typeof(object[][]));
        using (var reader = System.IO.File.OpenText(output))
            return (object[][])serializer.Deserialize(reader);
    }
    finally
    {
        if (System.IO.File.Exists(output))
            System.IO.File.Delete(output);
    }
}