Storing Microsoft Word 97 documents in SQL Server column

Question

I have this database with a table which has the the following but I have no way to decypher it

DATA,        TYPE,            FILE TYPE, SIZE,  DOC TYPE
0x15234324 , Word.Document.8 ,DOC,       19968, WORD.DOCUMENT.8

The field seems to contain a word document stored in a SQL Server IMAGE column

Has anyone come across this before or a way to extract this data in a readable format?

So far I have tried using PHP to extract the file and write it to a word document but not had much luck.

UPDATE: I now have Visual Studio Express and would like a way to extract this data and save to a word document

UPDATE2: This is what I have in VB sofar

Imports System.Data.SqlClient
Imports System.IO


Public Class Form1

    Private Shared Function RetrieveFile(ByVal filename As String) As Byte()
        Dim connection As New SqlConnection("Server=sqlsrv;database=database;Trusted_Connection=Yes;")
        Dim command As New SqlCommand("select data from objects where object_ref in (select data from parts where object_ref =239804)", connection)
        command.Parameters.AddWithValue("test", filename)
        connection.Open()
        Dim reader As SqlDataReader = command.ExecuteReader(System.Data.CommandBehavior.SequentialAccess)
        reader.Read()
        Dim memory As New MemoryStream()
        Dim startIndex As Long = 0
        Const ChunkSize As Integer = 256
        While True
            Dim buffer As Byte() = New Byte(ChunkSize - 1) {}
            Dim retrievedBytes As Long = reader.GetBytes(1, startIndex, buffer, 0, ChunkSize)
            memory.Write(buffer, 0, CInt(retrievedBytes))
            startIndex += retrievedBytes
            If retrievedBytes <> ChunkSize Then
                Exit While
            End If
        End While
        connection.Close()
        Dim data As Byte() = memory.ToArray()
        memory.Dispose()
        Return data


    End Function


    Private Sub Button2_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Button2.Click
        Dim saveFileDialog1 As New SaveFileDialog()
        saveFileDialog1.Filter = "Doc File|*.doc"
        saveFileDialog1.Title = "Save an doc File"
        saveFileDialog1.ShowDialog()

        If saveFileDialog1.FileName <> "" Then
            Dim fs As New System.IO.FileStream(saveFileDialog1.FileName, System.IO.FileMode.Create, System.IO.FileAccess.Write)
            Dim data As Byte() = RetrieveFile("test.doc")
            fs.Write(data, 0, data.Length)
            fs.Flush()
            fs.Close()
        End If
    End Sub




End Class

Answer 1

I wrote a VBS script to pull data out of sharepoint blobs a while back, here's a generic version of it:

Const adOpenKeyset                  = 1
Const adLockOptimistic              = 3
Const adTypeBinary                  = 1
Const adSaveCreateOverWrite         = 2

strSQLServer = "YOURSERVER"
strSQLDatabase = "YOURDB"
strRecordID = "123"
strTempFileName = "c:\output.doc"

Set objConn = CreateObject("ADODB.Connection")
Set objRS = CreateObject("ADODB.RecordSet")
Set objStream = CreateObject("ADODB.Stream")

objConn.Open "Provider=SQLOLEDB;data Source=" & strSQLServer & ";Initial Catalog=" & strSQLDatabase & "; Trusted_Connection=yes;"
objRS.Open "Select * from AllDocStreams WHERE ID='" & strRecordID & "'", objConn, adOpenKeyset, adLockOptimistic

objStream.Type = adTypeBinary
objStream.Open
objStream.Write objRS.Fields("Content").Value
objStream.SaveToFile strTempFileName, adSaveCreateOverWrite

objRS.Close
objConn.Close

Answer 2

C# code:

connection.Open();
SqlCommand command1 = new SqlCommand("select DATA from TABLE where ...", connection);
byte[] img = (byte[])command1.ExecuteScalar();
File.WriteAllBytes("your_path/word.doc", img);

That should be the logic. Write something similar in any language you know. It shouldn't be hard in PHP or whatever you are using.