The final story...how to get data out of Oracle....

So after waaaayyyy too much testing, if you're going to get Oracle, here are your best options...

1. ADO.Net DataReader with a ADO.Net for ODBC driver. Create a system DSN, and you're good to go. No problems with the NUMBER datatypes I mentioned above, as they are all converted to floats.

2. ADO.Net DataReader with the ADO.Net Oracle Client - Not as fast, and all numbers with decimal places will be cut off.

3. OLE DB connection - Use the Microsoft Driver first. It at least sets the precision and scale for you. It is wrong if you have decimal places, but you can adjust that in the advanced editor.

4. OLE DB Connection with Oracle OLE DB Driver - this is pure luck if it works, and most number fields will bomb out! You can manually creaet every column from scratch in the advanced editor, but by the time you get to the third column, you'll switch to one of the other methods....oh yeah...this is the slowest read times as well.....

Scott Barrett