Microsoft KB Archive/296656

= Ldifde.exe Returns an Error Message with &quot;<&quot; Character During Import =

Article ID: 296656

Article Last Modified on 2/20/2007

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 1
 * Microsoft Windows 2000 Advanced Server
 * Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 1

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This article was previously published under Q296656



SYMPTOMS
When you import data to Active Directory by using the Ldifde utility, the process may not work and may generate the following error message:

There is a syntax error in the input file

Failed on token starting with ... on line ...

0 entries modified successfully.

An error has occurred in the program

The second line in the error message contains data about the line in the input file in which the error occurred. That information was removed from this sample error message.



CAUSE
When the data was originally exported, certain characters did not trigger Base64 encoding of the string. The fix that is documented in this article corrects support for data that begins with characters that are defined in the Request for Comments (RFC) specification, including the space, colon, or &quot;<&quot; and &quot;>&quot; characters.



RESOLUTION
To resolve this problem, obtain the latest service pack for Windows 2000. For additional information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

260910 How to Obtain the Latest Windows 2000 Service Pack



WORKAROUND
You can use the CSV Directory Exchange Tool (Csvde.exe), which is a close relative to Ldifde.exe, without the same restriction. Csvde.exe uses comma-separated value files.



STATUS
Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article. This problem was first corrected in Windows 2000 Service Pack 3.

Additional query words: kbDirServices angle bracket less than

Keywords: kbbug kbfix kbwin2000sp3fix kbdirservices KB296656

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