Microsoft KB Archive/304537

= BUG: Message Box with Question Marks Appears When You Use ODBC for Oracle Driver to Create a New Data Source =

Article ID: 304537

Article Last Modified on 5/8/2003

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APPLIES TO

 Microsoft Data Access Components 2.6, when used with:  Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 1

 Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 2  Microsoft Data Access Components 2.7, when used with:  Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 1

 Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 2</li></ul> </li></ul>

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This article was previously published under Q304537

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SYMPTOMS
Under Windows 2000 with Multilanguage User Interface installed, when you use the Microsoft ODBC for Oracle Driver to create an ODBC data source in the ODBC Administration application, a message box appears that contains only question marks.

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CAUSE
The actual error message being that should be displayed is:

The Oracle(tm) client and networking components were not found. These components are supplied by Oracle Corporation and are part of the Oracle Version 7.3 (or greater) client software installation.

You will be unable to use this driver until these components have been installed.

The Multilanguage User Interface functionality in Windows 2000 requires that strings (such as error messages,) be Unicode. When different code pages are in use, the conversion of these strings internally between ANSI and Unicode results in non-sensible text or, in this case, a string of question marks.

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RESOLUTION
To resolve this problem, install the Oracle client version 7.3 or later, which installs the components that are needed to create an ODBC Data Source.

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STATUS
This behavior is by design.

Keywords: kbbug kbnofix kboracle KB304537

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