Just to offer more info, I tried updating the program but the Update option in the bottom right corner doesn't show any available updates.

Hi Christopher,

Christopher Millard said:

Unfortunately, I had my work laptop stolen last night.

Ohhhh! ((( So painful! Such things still happen..

Christopher Millard said:

Here I click "Yes" and nothing happens.

Probably, you were using pretty old version of TBM, and now you've installed very new one. And there was an point when update from old ver to latest one became impossible. Needed some intermediary update. So, two options:

1. Send me your database file. Fast solution for you, worse for me.. But you get updated database file. But since it contains sensitive info, probably it's wont be acceptable for you.

2. Do it on your own. Install Microsoft SQL CE
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=30709
Install SQL CE Toolbox
https://ci.appveyor.com/api/projects/ErikEJ/sqlcetoolbox/artifacts/SqlCe40ToolBox.zip?branch=master
Run it and connect to your database file. Open it, expand list of tables, find ModuleInfo table, right click, Edit top rows, and find version you have used:

Then, I can send you installer of exactly that version. And list of intermediary installers from your version to a latest one. 

This all should help!

Eugene, you're a lifesaver! I want to give you as little work as possible so I've tried doing what you said. If I've got the right backup of my database (fingers crossed), I need version 5.3.38.0. Thanks a million!

Probably not, because 5.3.38 is pretty new version. There should not be issues with database update. Interesting which one you've installed.

Anyway, let's try to start with this concrete installer:

https://www.ibaccs.com/download/sdl_business_manager_5.3.38.0.exe

If you will still be getting an error, can you please send me log file from the app installation folder?

Just installed 5.3.38, copied my database into the folder and.. It works! Amazing! I was also surprised it gave me the error message with a new version. Should I try to update to the latest version? I tried opening this database with both 5.3.5 and 6 (the two versions I have access to download) but neither worked with my copy of the database.

Also, just FYI, I had a back-up (.bak) from months ago which curiously enough did open with 5.3.5. Perhaps to upgrade I'll need to save and use a back-up? 

In any case, you've really saved me hours upon hours of trawling through jobs and invoices to recreate the data. Thank you!

Hello, Christopher,

So great that it helped and now works!!!

You can't open this database in v6. To upgrade to v6, you can follow this help article:

community.sdl.com/.../upgrading-from-version-5

Christopher Millard said:

Also, just FYI, I had a back-up (.bak) from months ago which curiously enough did open with 5.3.5. Perhaps to upgrade I'll need to save and use a back-up? 

Can you please clarify? If it started to work with 5.3.38, why to use older backup?

Sorry, I may not have been clear. I'll try to clarify. Before you sent me the solution, I found I had a back-up I had made manually months ago. I tried opening it out of curiosity and it did work with 5.3.5. I didn't use this back-up because it was months old and would have meant losing lots of recent data. I mention it only because this might be an interesting fact for you to know: the up-to-date database wouldn't open but the .bak file did work.

Yeah, because it depends on version. With each app update, database model is changed (columns/tables could be added, removed, or renamed). And if you try to open database from version 5.3.38 in version 5.3.5 (which is much older), it won't work, because old version doesn't know about new database structure, so it can't read data correctly. That's why old file worked, but newer - not. Anyway, great that it works well