What do I do when ReadyShipper can't establish the database connection?

If you are receiving the following error message when opening ReadyShipper Pro, it is often caused by a corrupted orders database:

To verify whether or not your database has been corrupted, please perform the following steps:

Completely shutdown ReadyShipper Pro, including any processs that may still be running in the background using Windows Task Managager (press Ctrl+Shift+Esc) on your keyboard to open the Task Manager and Force Close anything processes named ReadyShipper.
Open a File Explorer and navigate to: Documents/ReadyShippper.
Inside this folder, you should see a folder named "database".
Right mouse click on the "database" folder and select Rename. Change the name of the folder from "database" to "database old"
Now go ahead and re-open ReadyShipper Pro and see if you still receive the same error message. ReadyShipper Pro may take a little longer than usual to start this time since it is rebuilding the orders database.
If you passed the loading screen and were able to successfully open ReadyShipper Pro, this indicates yours orders database had become corrupted. This can happen for a number of different reasons, such as a sudden power loss to your computer, ReadyShipper Pro being shutdown incorrectly before the database was updated, and a few others.
Unfortunately this does mean that you will no longer be able to see any of the orders you had previously saved in ReadyShipper. There are two potential ways to fix this:
1. If you have a ReadyCloud backup account and have been actively backuping your orders, you may be able to restore your orders by navigating to Business Systems --> ReadyCloud --> Restore Orders. If this this setting is grayed out, you may have to login first. Click the Settings option and enter your ReadyCloud account credentials and login.Then go back and see if the Restore Orders option is still grayed out. If not, it should allow you to pick a backup date to start restoring your orders from.
2. If you have been actively updating your tracking numbers to your e-commerce store, you may just be able to changed the "Imported Order Statuses" for that store and also import all of your old Shipped orders back into ReadyShipper Pro directly from your e-commerce store. This may not be available with all platforms.