This document assumes you are familiar with SQL Server and it's tools and have SQL Server Management Studio installed on your computer.

In order to access the SWCS 4.2 company database you'll need to gather some information from SWCS such as  the name of the SQL Server, database name and login information. This information can be found in the .psd  file which is located in the \Companies folder along with the actual database files .mdf and .ldf.

To open the .psd file

1. Run SWCS 
   
2. From the File menu click File Manager. 
   
3. Make sure the file type selected is Companies. 
   
4. In the list of files locate the file with the type "PSD". 
   
5. Right-click on the file and click "Show in Windows Explorer". When Windows Explorer opens it will 
   
6. navigate to the \Companies folder and select the .psd file. 
   
7. Right-click on the file in Windows Explorer, select Open With, and open the file in Notepad (or your 
   
8. favorite text editor). 
   

Gathering information from the .psd file

1. Locate the text between <CompanyDatabase> and </CompanyDatabase>. Write this down as the database name. 
   
2. Locate the text between <Host> and </Host>. Write this down as the SQL Server. 
   
3. Locate the number between <Auth> and </Auth>. If this number is 0 then write down "Windows Authentication" otherwise write down "SQL Server Authentication". 
   
4. If you see <User> and </User> then write down the text between these tokens as the user name. Most of the time these nodes will not be this file. In that case write down "sa" (without the quotes) as the user name. 
5. If you see <Password> and </Password> then write down the text between these tokens as the password. Most of the time these nodes will not be this file. In that case write down "swcs" (without the quotes) as the password.

Connect to the database using SQL Server Management Studio

1. Run SQL Server Management Studio 
   
2. When asked to connect to the database enter the name of the SQL Server that you wrote down. 
   
3. If you wrote down "Windows Authentication" then select Windows Authentication, otherwise select SQL Server Authentication. 
   
4. If you selected SQL Server Authentication then enter the user name and password that you wrote down. 
   
5. Click Connect to connect to the server. 
   
6. Once connected, expand the list of databases and expand the database where the name matches the one you wrote down. 
   

Note

• Make sure you have a recent database backup for proceeding with any further interaction with the database. 
  
• Do not add, update or delete records in any of the tables. 
  
• Do not change the structure of any of the existing tables in any way. Doing so will prevent SWCS 4.2 from opening the database. 
• You can add tables if required.