Opening mdb files in Ubuntu

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I think you'd better install the mdbtools-gmdb (http://packages.ubuntu.com/trusty/mdbtools-gmdb) through Ubuntu package manager, otherwise there are no guarantees that the package is binary compatible. (Lots of distros use .deb)

Re: Installing mdbtools, line should be:

sudo apt-get install mdbtools-gmdb

That's why you go the 'Invalid operation...' error.

(can't comment yet, hence the separate answer)

You can use DBeaver. It has "MS Access (UCanAccess)" driver to open .mdb files.

To install:

wget https://dbeaver.io/files/dbeaver-ce_latest_amd64.deb
sudo dpkg -i dbeaver-ce_latest_amd64.deb
sudo apt install -f

Then connect to the .mdb file:

Tested on version 21.0.0

On Ubuntu 18.04 I tried installing mdbtools-gmdb but it couldn't find the package. I ended up installing mdbtools with apt install mdbtools.

This package provides libraries to connect to mdb files as well as command line utilities including mdb-tables, mdb-export, mdb-sql, etc.

If you only want to view or export the contained data you also could use an online viewer/exporter like www.mdbopener.com.

mdbopener.com is using the mdbtools for .mdb files and the jackcess library (java) for .accdb files. Disclosure: I am the creator of www.mdbopener.com