Wait, first of All, dont use the Database.mdf file, you would accidently over-write it, when you upgrade the version ( I know this for sure, becuase I met with this accident every time )

Second the problem, that you have listed, looks like that the DNN is not able to find the Database, either the connection string is wrong, or something else, check the connection string, that might help

Mitchel...

It is still being investigated, but the outlook appears pretty grim; looks like we're going to end up having to start over with a clean slate.

My background is in design, so my understanding of the programming/development side of things could very much be described as novice-level.  I can write and code HTML, but this is all a little over my head...maybe you can help me...

I am wondering whether it is possible for me to retrieve some of the body copy I wrote for our portal back when everything was still in working order.  For example, I was compiling a list of FAQs...can I get into a file in the DotNetNuke folder to view these questions?  Basically, I'm just hoping that I have something I can reference (or even copy and paste) so I don't have to re-write these all from scratch based on what I can remember.  I know that if we were dealing with HTML or XML files, this would be entirely possible, but within the DNN environment, I'm not so sure...

Thanks.
--Daniel

Maybe I'm missing something here, but if you backed up the DotNetNuke folder before your boss wiped it, can't you just open up the Database.mdf file and see if any of your data is in there?

I know there's a tutorial around the web that shows you how to do such a thing. Hopefully the error you got when the site went down was due to trashed stored procedures, and not trashed tables.

Go look in the backed up folder and see how big the Database.mdf file is. If it's bigger than 1216 K then there might be data still in there.