Problems With Restore on Version 9.05

[George E. Tabb Jr. 0]

When I try to restore a backup that I created on my laptop, I get the following message:

 

 

Variable 'LATEMP' is not found 44

 

FRMWIZRESTORE.WIZPAGEFRAME1.PAGE1.COM.INI

 

 

I am using TMG V 9.05 and back up my file to C:\TMG Backups

 

I have no idea what is causing this problem and would greatly appreciate any help you can give me on what to do about it. Thanks so much!

 

George E. Tabb, Jr.

[Jim Byram 0]

1) Run the TMG v9.05 installer and select [Repair] to make sure that your installation is complete.

 

2) Make sure that the .SQZ backup is on your hard drive when you try to restore. (That appears to be the case now.)

[George E. Tabb Jr. 0]

Jim,

 

Thanks very much for your very quick response. I did as you said and ran the repair on the installer. I also made sure the .SQZ file was on my hard drive. When I ran restore this time, I got the following message:

 

DynaZip UnZip Error:

 

DynaZip Unzip Error: Error creating output file (Problem extracting file(s)

 

What should I do now?

 

Many thanks!

 

George E. Tabb, Jr.

[Jim Byram 0]

That's the sort of error that you typically get when trying to restore from a flash drive or some other external media.

 

Is the .SQZ file intact? Rename the backup filetype from .SQZ to .ZIP and see if you can browse into the file with Windows Explorer. Windows Explorer treats a .ZIP file as a folder.

[George E. Tabb Jr. 0]

I renamed the file as you suggested and it did allow me to browse it as a folder. What should I do now?

[Jim Byram 0]

You can copy the project files from the renamed ZIP file to your projects folder (or whatever folder holds your project) overwriting the existing files. This accomplishes the restore. Just be sure to reindex the first time that you open the project.

[George E. Tabb Jr. 0]

What if the file is not intact? If I copy it into my project folder and it is not intact, will I lose my data?

[Jim Byram 0]

Why are you restoring to start with?

 

If you send me your backup, I'll check the project. You can contact me by email by clicking the link below...

Jim Byram

[Jim 0]

Jim

I'm having the same problem and I have been following your instructions and nothing is working for me. My most recent backup was placed on external cloud drive called OneDrive.  I have followed your subjections to Mr Tabb but nothing has worked so far.

[cassb 0]

I am having the same issue.  I'm a computer programmer, so I've tried several things to see if I can get it to work.  Nothing works yet.

This started when I made some changes to a project and then tried to back up the project.  I got errors regarding unable to access or write to file REPEAT.CDX.  So I renamed that file in the Repeat_files folder and tried again.  Then got an error about unable to read files Last Backup.log and List of external exhibits.log in the Logs folder.  So I renamed those and tried again.  It then got all the way through backing up the project until at the end it says something about a ZIP file being in use, and it didn't create the .SQZ file (but said it completed successfully when I dismissed the error dialog).

So I tried backing up without any compression.  Same error message, same result. I copied all the folders and files in The Master Genealogist v9 folder to another location, then uninstalled TMG and reinstalled it again.  Then when opening the fresh install, tried to restore a previous successful backup file.  No luck there either.  I'm getting the original poster's message:

Variable 'LATEMP' is not found. 44

FRMWIZRESTORE.WIZPAGEFRAME1.PAGE1.CON.INIT

 

I am wondering if one of the recent Windows 10 updates has broken FoxPro or something.  That would be a major problem for TMG users with no recourse except to change programs, and I don't want to change to yet another genealogy program (TMG is #4 for me since I started in 1990s).

Is anyone still supporting TMG at all?  Is the source code available?  Maybe I could at least debug it for now.  I an fluent in databases and C#, Python, VB, and can learn any language.

[cassb 0]

I am having the same issue.  I'm a computer programmer, so I've tried several things to see if I can get it to work.  Nothing works yet.

This started when I made some changes to a project and then tried to back up the project.  I got errors regarding unable to access or write to file REPEAT.CDX.  So I renamed that file in the Repeat_files folder and tried again.  Then got an error about unable to read files Last Backup.log and List of external exhibits.log in the Logs folder.  So I renamed those and tried again.  It then got all the way through backing up the project until at the end it says something about a ZIP file being in use, and it didn't create the .SQZ file (but said it completed successfully when I dismissed the error dialog).

So I tried backing up without any compression.  Same error message, same result. I copied all the folders and files in The Master Genealogist v9 folder to another location, then uninstalled TMG and reinstalled it again.  Then when opening the fresh install, tried to restore a previous successful backup file.  No luck there either.  I'm getting the original poster's message:

Variable 'LATEMP' is not found. 44

FRMWIZRESTORE.WIZPAGEFRAME1.PAGE1.CON.INIT

 

I am wondering if one of the recent Windows 10 updates has broken FoxPro or something.  That would be a major problem for TMG users with no recourse except to change programs, and I don't want to change to yet another genealogy program (TMG is #4 for me since I started in 1990s).

Is anyone still supporting TMG at all?  Is the source code available?  Maybe I could at least debug it for now.  I an fluent in databases and C#, Python, VB, and can learn any language.

 

---------

Update: After reinstalling v9.05, I was able to restore the previous backup SQZ file and open the program.  I immediately tried to do a backup of the restored project again, but am still receiving the error I was getting before doing all this. I have no idea what this error means.  There are no other processes dealing with ZIP files I can see on my PC.

 

 

When I click OK, I get this, but there is no new SQZ file in Backups folder or any new log files in Logs folder:

[cassb 0]

I uninstalled TMG9, deleted The Master Genealogist folder in Program Data and in C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming. I renamed it to The Master Genealogist v9 - old in My Documents folder so that a new folder would be created.

Then installed it again. It installed and set up correctly, and I opened the sample project for testing. The GoTo function does not work (Search works):

The Windows Explorer Open window opens and looks like it's expecting a DBF file. Selecting a file or clicking cancel repeatedly ends up with this error msg:

Something happened while I was using TMG yesterday because GoTo was working fine until after I tried backing up the project and all these issues started. I also get this error when trying to back up the sample project on the fresh install:

Maybe registry keys need to be reset and then another re-install? Or can anyone explain what this error means?

Edited September 18, 2025 by cassb

[cassb 0]

I mess with Windows Services sometimes and disable ones I don't think I need.  Maybe TMG needs certain services running?  Is there a list of services it uses?

---------

well, I got it running finally.  I did another uninstall using REVOUninstaller and removed all registry and file entries it found. Set all Disabled services to Manual. Then rebooted in safe mode and installed again.  This time it's mostly working - I was able to copy the saved Project folder into ../Documents/The Master Genealogist v9 and opened the project.  The GoTo button works and I can back up the project with no errors. I then did File/Data Set Manager/Export and exported the whole project to a .GED successfully.  Tried also exporting a DIF file and that crashed.  Tried exporting to Microsoft Excel file and it keeps prompting for DBF files as above, looking for curselection.dbf, exp_p.dbf, exp_ppv.dbf, expss1.dbf, exp_n.dbf, exp_m.dbf.  These seem to be files needed for export.

These look like internal Visual FoxPro files it's looking for.  So I don't know if Visual FoxPro no longer works on the current Windows versions.  Maybe that's the problem.  In that case, we will all need to either continue using TMG on older Windows versions, or abandon TMG and find some other software program that has the same functionality and can import the data.  Or move all your data online into someone else's software/storage like Ancestry or FamilySearch or MyHeritage, which is not ideal as you lose control of your data. But that seems to be the only option going forward.

 

Any ideas from other ex-TMG users?  USGenWeb maybe?  I have my data on Rootweb that I used SecondSite to format, but I think that's not updateable any more.

 

----------

By the way, it only seems to work in Safe Mode now. Without safe mode on, I still get lots of Visual FoxPro generated errors about dbf files, cdx files, out of space errors (I have 109GB free on the drive). I did upgrade to a SSD this year -- maybe Visual FoxPro 9 can't handle the speed of the drive?

Edited September 18, 2025 by cassb

[Jim 0]

I've read your post with interest and I don't know if my problem is the same as your or not. When I attempted to open my project after a few weeks, the first thing I noticed was that TMG opened in repair mode. then the problems began. I don't have anywhere near the computer skills you have but am a long time user of TMG and I kind of lost without it.

I made my last backup on 29 Aug 2025. Perhaps , unfortunately, that backup was sent to Microsoft's OneDrive (external drive). I am able to retrieve that file and it appears be to just fine (jpivey 2025-08-29 10-23-16.sqz). When I attempt to restore that file to TMG, it first appears that everything looks find ( I can see flashes of files being restored in the top right of the restore screen), then it goes to the next restore screen and asks the locations I want, etc,  than the restore screen asks about configuration and timelines, and the last screen asks about type of files, to be restored, and finally I press "finish". I get this error message:  'DyanZip error: Error creating output file (problem extracting file(s). I also note that after that, the TMG program locks up.

I've been struggling with  this problem for over a week now and have made no progress, I would appreciate any help you can send my way,

[cassb 0]

Try rebooting your computer in safe mode and then try the restore and see if that works.

For my issue, I'm finding that there are messed up file permissions and tmg can't open or write to some files it created. Really weird errors, probably having to do with Visual FoxPro 9, and it seems to all be OK in safe mode. I can't even take ownership or change permissions on the files from admin or system accounts. I'll do some more digging this weekend.

It just may be time to put tmg to rest and find another program.

 

[cassb 0]

omg.  I finally figured it out.  My brain hurts.

It ended up being a Windows Defender issue that I had no idea about. There must have been an update within the past year or so since I last used TMG, or I played with Windows Defender settings re: my Documents folder, which was blocking access to TMG and causing the errors. It's now working again with no errors and backups are working again too.  Sheesh. 

Here's how I fixed it, in case anyone else runs into weird Visual FoxPro errors like this. (this is in Windows 10 - it may be slightly different in Windows 11 or later):

1. Go to Windows Security (I typed Security in the Search box in Windows and clicked on Windows Security app).
2. Click on Virus & threat protection.
3. Click "Manage settings" link under Virus & threat protection settings
4. Scroll down and click "Manage Controlled folder access" link under Controlled folder access.
5. On the Ransomware protection screen, the switch under Controlled folder access was "on" for me.  Click on Allow an app through Controlled folder access link.
6. Click on the 'Add an allowed app' button and select 'Recently blocked apps' if this issue just started happening.
7. It will show a list of apps that have been blocked, one of which should be tmg9.exe.  Click on the + button next to tmg9.exe to allow access.

Voila.  That should fix it.  Wow, that sent me down a rabbit hole I really didn't want to be in.  :-)

[Jim 0]

Your idea of trying rebooting in safe mode , solved my problem.

I was able to restore my backup without any problem. Thank you so much for your help and I'm happy to see you solved yours as well.

[cassb 0]

Glad that worked for you, Jim. There must be some background process that is preventing the restore in normal mode. I wonder if it's related to anti-virus software like mine was.

[Jim 0]

I believe my problem has to do with my Project  vs my Data set, I not real clear on the difference between the two. One of the problems has to do with using # tab ( finding person by Id).  When I put #1 (which should be me, I am taken to a menu that shows a list of .dbf files rather than taking me directly  to that person. There are other similar little things that just don't seem right. I'm beginning to think it has to do with "Project" vs "Data set" which I am not very clear on. Any ideas? You have been lots of help so far, maybe to can make sense out of this.

  

[cassb 0]

Yes, that popup window that opens looking for a .DBF file is a symptom of the problem I had. If you click cancel over and over, or just select random DBF files until it's satisfied, then it should come up with a "Alias <something> not found" message. I think that's because it cannot open the proper DBF file because access is denied.

If you don't get that popup window in Safe Mode, then I would definitely look at Windows Defender as the culprit, denying access from the tmg9.exe program. See my steps above.