Extract text from Universal Data Link files (UDL)
To convert UDL Data links to another format, you need Microsoft Windows or other Database software.
To convert other file formats to the "Connection File" file type, you need software like Microsoft Windows or a similar tool.
A .UDL (Universal Data Link) file is a configuration file used by Windows applications to specify connection parameters for an OLE DB data source. It is fundamentally a text file encoded in UTF-16 (LE). System administrators and database developers use it alongside Microsoft Data Access Components (MDAC) to store credentials, server addresses, and driver information. You can create or edit these files natively using the Windows Data Link Properties dialog or view them in text editors like Notepad++.
Despite being a standard in legacy Windows enterprise environments, the .UDL format has major disadvantages today. It is deeply tied to the Windows OS ecosystem and specifically to legacy OLE DB drivers, making it entirely unsupported on macOS, Linux, and modern cloud-native deployments. Modern applications have largely abandoned .UDL files in favor of secure connection strings stored in CONFIG, JSON, or ENV files. Leaving credentials in a loosely managed .UDL file can also present security and maintenance challenges.
To modernize your application, you must convert the connection data within a .UDL file to standard TXT, XML, or JSON formats. Converting the file ensures your database routing info can be parsed by cross-platform frameworks and modern APIs. Because this is a specialized Windows configuration format, generic online converters often fail to process it intelligently. Emphasize that often only the original software can properly read or export the data. convert.guru can still identify the file format, inspect the file, and show text or internal content. If our analysis detects a supported underlying or embedded format, viewing or conversion may still be possible. Just drag and drop your file to see what it is and convert it if supported.
Convert.Guru analyzes your UDL file, detects the exact format, and lets you read the text inside.
Users also converted XLSX, UDF, PDF, EXE, BIN and DOCX files.
If you want to convert UDL file to DB, SQLITE, SQLITE3, MDB, ACCDB, DBF, ODB, FDB, GDB, MYD, FRM or SQL, you can use Microsoft Windows or similar software from the "Database Connection Configuration" category. In the File menu, look for Save As… or Export….
To convert NDF, SQLITE3, BAK, RDB, SQL, DB4, MDF, MDB, LDF, DB, DB3 or SQLITE files to UDL, try Microsoft Windows or another comparable tool in the "Database Connection Configuration" category.
The history of Convert.Guru began over 25 years ago in California with Tom Simondi’s file-format database. A former contributor to Space Shuttle development and a software pioneer of the 1980s, Simondi established a trusted resource for file type analysis that was even referenced by Microsoft Windows XP. Today, we use modern technology to process and convert thousands of file formats while continually improving our UDL converter.