Yeah, thanks, that is another option I also thought about, but it would be clunky to automate (unless I'm just using a few symbols, as you suggest), and speed of processing large ASCII sets definitely suffers vs. using native WL binary data. Thanks for throwing that out as a possible solution.
Option Attack, Here are some additional findings which may be of interest to you: My WL3 license is licensed on a Windows 2000 SP4 machine and on a Windows XP SP3 machine. I discovered that for existing Datasources ONLY, the Daily Update function actually still works on the XP machine, but not on the 2000 machine. Same version of WL (3.01 Build 21b) on both machines, just different OS's. I use a FREE piece of Proxy Server software that runs in the background (you can download from Aronowsoftware.com), to allow this communication to Yahoo to occur. Since Yahoo went out to lunch last month, other than the Daily Update function on my XP machine, all other WL update functions broke. I determined through the Proxy Server I'm trying to build that the Daily Update call is going out to quotes.yahoo.com (which is still functional) whereas the other WL functions (Web Update, for example) go out to table.finance.yahoo.com (which is defunct). The Aronow proxy server software actually re-vectored table.finance.yahoo.com to ichart.finance.yahoo.com (which broke last month). Additionally, I cannot create new data sources on the XP machine either. Regarding the Daily Update function still working on XP, any clues why it wouldn't work on 2000? My 2000 machine is tons faster than my XP-based laptop.
I'm impressed you still have those old machines running! I only seem to get about 10 years before my machines die. Not sure why 2000 won't work. My daily update process for years was just to update TC2000, then restart WL. Always worked fine. But I cringe every time I change to a new computer. Will it still work?. WL is keyed to hardware so you have to get a new key code, which sucks. I have Amibroker, but still like the ease of using WL. Eugene at WL/Fidelity will still answer email about keys, if you are listed as a licensed owner. Don't know if Glitch is still involved or if Eugene will help with older version WL problems like your update issue. I was bummed when Glitch sold out to Fido, but time marches on...
Eugene is still there, and I believe will issue new codes for new machines, but WL3 only runs on XP and below. Eugene will not answer support questions on WL3 - I've tried - and is pretty gagged on proprietary stuff by Fidelity. What's really unfortunate is that the old Wealthlab support website for V3 and V4, was dismantled - that was such a great source of info - but the Fidelity purchase of WL kabashed that unfortunately. The update issue is really with the above-mentioned Proxylab public domain software. I've reached out to that SW author, and based on dialog, I don't think he has the bandwidth to try and fix it. Since it's free, there is no support on it. Glitch is long gone, but Cone and Eugene are still there. I keep these old machines around for WL and a couple of other SW packages I have (non-finance related), because they don't run on newer machines/OS's. I have some really good scans on WL that run on EOD data, and I want to preserve using that environment, since I'm an old Pascal guy too. I'll keep you posted, if I can figure this out. In the meantime, if you have WL3 running on an XP machine, check out the Proxylab tool mentioned above - like I said, it will allow you to Daily Update existing sources from Yahoo.
For licensing, since it's abandonware and they refuse to provide support, you're better off using a version that you didn't pay for as it's not tied to the machine you're using, will work on anything. WL3 works fine on Windows 10, first start in compatibility mode but as it seems to "learn" - after the first run you can run it as is in regular mode. I'm using it now, works as expected. In Windows 7, it won't work but I used an XP virtual machine, no problems at all.
By the way, there are 2 ways to import ASCII into WL3: 1) You can create a new Data Source (ASCII Files), and import that way. However, the files are stored in text format, and speed is definitely an issue, if you have large datasets; 2) If you go to the "Data Editor" function in Data Source Manager, there is an Import Facility that allows you to load ASCII files and converts them directly to *.WL binary files. I like this option better than # 1.