All about UDL Files

The UDL file type is primarily associated with Data Link Tool.

UDL	File extension: UDL
	File type:	data source definition

What is a UDL file

UDL files mostly belong to Data Link Tool by Microsoft. A UDL file is a universal data link used to connect to a data source (e.g. SQL Server or Access) in a Windows environment. A universal data link (UDL) file may be created and edited with Data Link Tool, a plain text editor, or the properties dialog box in Data Link API. The file contains a data source definition (URL, database/table name(s), queries, and user credentials) for manipulating data from various sources. Another type of UDL file is a database exported from ADONIS business process management software suite.

How do you open UDL files?

You need a suitable software like Data Link Tool to open a UDL file. Without proper software you will receive a Windows message "How do you want to open this file?" or "Windows cannot open this file" or a similar Mac/iPhone/Android alert. If you cannot open your UDL file correctly, try to right-click or long-press the file. Then click "Open with" and choose an application. You can also display a UDL file directly in the browser:. Just drag the file onto this browser window and drop it.

Online UDL Text Viewer

Choose your .udl file to analyze

or drag and drop it here

Online File Viewer

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UDL file format:

To view or edit UDL files you need to know the file format, because it determines how the data in this file is stored. The initial characters of a file are called signature, sometimes also referred to as "magic bytes". The signature can be used to infer the file format. If the file extension does not match the file format, double-clicking on the file will cause an error upon opening. If there are problems opening a file, you must first determine the file format used. Our examination of the UDL files comes to the following conclusion:

The UDL file extension is rarely used and is primarily used by a single program. The file formats most commonly found in UDL files are:

• 65% of all UDL files internally utilize the UTF-16 (LE) file format. UTF-16 (LE) is an character encoding system for Unicode. UTF-16 files can be viewed in any modern text editor. These files start with the two bytes FF FE, the so called byte order mark (BOM). They consist of illegible, cryptic characters. The file size is in the range of 310 bytes to 430 bytes. The file type was created 10 years ago, but is still used today. The following keywords are characteristic: [oledb], ; Everything after this line is an OLE DB initstring, Provider, Microsoft and SQLOLEDB. A usual file name is mssql_test.udl. These files are attributed to data, mssql, document, server, conn and text.

All other UDL files (35%) have no uniform format. These files sometimes refer to peloton or view. If you want to find out what your UDL file contains, drag and drop it onto this page.