Strange Foxpro problem.

Factual Questions
1

I am currently the ‘acting’ admin person where I work(we’re in the process of hiring someone) and I’m having a problem with a particular Dell PC(550Mgz 128MB RAM Win98-SE) running FoxPro applications. The PC is set up on a Novell Network and currently has several FoxPro applications that run without any problems at all. However, If I try to install or copy any new FoxPro programs, I get an “Invalid Path or File Name” error when opening them. I tried putting the .exe file in a shared folder located on the server and got the same error. Then I ran it from another workstation without a problem. I then, from the bad PC, tried running a non-foxpro program(Windiff) off the server and it ran without incident. I changed the data cable and the port and got the same error.

There’s something about this PC that wont allow it to run foxpro applications that arent already installed on it. It’s just a simple .exe file that you can just double click to execute so there’s no path involved nor are there any files that are associated with it.

I’m outta ideas… Anyone have a suggestion? I could just wait until we hire someone but I think it’d impress the boss if I could fix it myself. esecially since I have a performance reveiw coming up next month.

2

I’m guessing one of two things:

1 - you got a virus on that machine that’s eating .exe files. The only problem with this theory is that you say “I ran it from another workstation without a problem.” When you say that, do you mean you copied the .exe from the “bad” computer to a different computer and it ran fine? If that’s the case, it’s probably not a virus.

2 - The .exe is not finding it’s dependencies. You say that there are no files associated with the .exe, but if it’s a FoxPro file I highly doubt it - last I heard FoxPro was an interpreted language, which means lots o’ dependencies. I usually get a different error message when this happens, but who knows what FoxPro does?

You can check the dependencies by downloading a dependency walker program from http://www.dependencywalker.com/. If this is the same program I use, it will show any dependencies that are not found with a red icon.

That’s my best guess.