This example shows basic usage of mdbtools to extract CSV/SQL from Microsoft databases, but also involves a fairly convoluted Bash loop. For a simpler example, go here: Using mdbtools to extract CSV data from the FAA Wildlife Strike Database

Working with Access files from the command line

Use mdbtools: https://github.com/brianb/mdbtools

If you're on a Mac, you can install mdbtools via homebrew:

  brew install mdbtools

Florida prison data

The landing page for the data file is here -- you'll be directed to a Google Drive link: http://www.dc.state.fl.us/pub/obis_request.html

Or you can download a copy of the data that I've stashed here:

http://stash.compjour.org/samples/prisons/florida-inmates--2015-10-26.mdb.zip

The zipped file is 164MB and uncompresses to 1.25GB

Convert to MDB

I stumbled upon this old but still useful blogpost about using mdbtools to convert to csv/mysql:

http://nialldonegan.me/2007/03/10/converting-microsoft-access-mdb-into-csv-or-mysql-in-linux/

All together

Here's the shell script I used to batch convert the Florida prison data, including downloading and unzipping the file via curl. Note that I took some time to make this a fire-and-forget script, hence the ugly use of pcregrep to extract tablenames from the mdb-schema command and use that to batch create and fill the data. You probably don't need to do this if you're trying to convert a MDB database that is less complicated than Florida's prison database.

MDBNAME=florida-inmates--2015-10-26.mdb

curl -O http://stash.compjour.org/samples/prisons/$MDBNAME.zip
unzip $MDBNAME.zip

while read table_name; do
  schemaname="$table_name.sqlite.schema.sql"
  echo "Creating $schemaname"
  mdb-schema -T "$table_name" $MDBNAME sqlite  2> /dev/null |
    pcregrep -oM 'CREATE TABLE(?:.|\n)+?\)\;\n' > "$schemaname" 
  
 # sqlite data
  sqlname="$table_name.sqlite.data.sql"
  echo "Creating $sqlname"
  mdb-export -I sqlite $MDBNAME  "$table_name" > "$sqlname"
  # CSV data
  csvname="$table_name.csv"
  echo "Creating $csvname"
  mdb-export $MDBNAME "$table_name" > "$csvname"
done < <(mdb-tables -1 $MDBNAME)

For each Access table, three files are generated:

A schema file in SQLite format
A data file in SQLite format
The table as plaintext CSV

Here are the final contents of the folder, when all is said and done:

├── CONTENTS.csv
├── CONTENTS.sqlite.data.sql
├── CONTENTS.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_ALIASES.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_ALIASES.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_ALIASES.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_DETAINERS.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_DETAINERS.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_DETAINERS.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_INCARHIST-cleaned.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_INCARHIST.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_INCARHIST.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_INCARHIST.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_OFFENSES_CPS-cleaned.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_OFFENSES_CPS.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_OFFENSES_CPS.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_OFFENSES_CPS.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_OFFENSES_prpr-cleaned.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_OFFENSES_prpr.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_OFFENSES_prpr.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_OFFENSES_prpr.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_ROOT-cleaned.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_ROOT.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_ROOT.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_ROOT.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_SCARSMARKS.csv
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_SCARSMARKS.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_ACTIVE_SCARSMARKS.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_ALIASES.csv
├── INMATE_RELEASE_ALIASES.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_ALIASES.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_DETAINERS.csv
├── INMATE_RELEASE_DETAINERS.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_DETAINERS.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_INCARHIST.csv
├── INMATE_RELEASE_INCARHIST.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_INCARHIST.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_OFFENSES_CPS.csv
├── INMATE_RELEASE_OFFENSES_CPS.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_OFFENSES_CPS.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_OFFENSES_prpr.csv
├── INMATE_RELEASE_OFFENSES_prpr.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_OFFENSES_prpr.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_RESIDENCE.csv
├── INMATE_RELEASE_RESIDENCE.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_RESIDENCE.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_ROOT.csv
├── INMATE_RELEASE_ROOT.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_ROOT.sqlite.schema.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_SCARSMARKS.csv
├── INMATE_RELEASE_SCARSMARKS.sqlite.data.sql
├── INMATE_RELEASE_SCARSMARKS.sqlite.schema.sql
├── OFFENDER_ALIASES.csv
├── OFFENDER_ALIASES.sqlite.data.sql
├── OFFENDER_ALIASES.sqlite.schema.sql
├── OFFENDER_OFFENSES_CCS.csv
├── OFFENDER_OFFENSES_CCS.sqlite.data.sql
├── OFFENDER_OFFENSES_CCS.sqlite.schema.sql
├── OFFENDER_RESIDENCE.csv
├── OFFENDER_RESIDENCE.sqlite.data.sql
├── OFFENDER_RESIDENCE.sqlite.schema.sql
├── OFFENDER_ROOT.csv
├── OFFENDER_ROOT.sqlite.data.sql
├── OFFENDER_ROOT.sqlite.schema.sql
├── florida-inmates--2015-10-26.mdb
└── florida-inmates--2015-10-26.mdb.zip

dannguyen/florida-prison-access-mdb-to-csv-sql.md

Working with Access files from the command line

Florida prison data

Convert to MDB

All together