No design option for Forms and Reports in frontend

[Repent]

I have a split DB and I wanted to modify one of the forms in my
frontend. When I right click on it the "design view" is ghosted out.
I thought I read that the front end houses everything but the tables,
which are contained in the backend.

Is something wrong here or am I mistaken?

chris

 

[Repent]

I think I've answered it myself. Looks like I have to modify the
original unsplit DB, resplit, then publish the changed frontend. Is
this correct? I can also disregard the new backend it creates?

Or would I modify the unsplit DB, then just create a accde file to
republish to users?

 

[Beetle]

I think I've answered it myself. Looks like I have to modify the

original unsplit DB, resplit, then publish the changed frontend. Is
this correct?

No. It sounds like you were attempting to make design changes to a
mde/accde front end, which isn't possible. You need to keep a master
copy of the front end in mdb/accdb format so that you can make design
changes, then redistribute as a mde/accde file.

There is no need to keep re-splitting the original monolithic file.

 

[John W. Vinson]

I think I've answered it myself. Looks like I have to modify the
original unsplit DB, resplit, then publish the changed frontend. Is
this correct? I can also disregard the new backend it creates?

Or would I modify the unsplit DB, then just create a accde file to
republish to users?

You certainly do NOT need to resplit!!! Doing so will lose all data changes
that your users have made to the backend since you split. <shudder>

You need to keep a copy of the .accdb frontend in order to make modifications
to it. It should have links to the backend; when you convert it to an .accde
for distribution, it will keep the links. However .accde databases do not
allow design changes to forms or reports, nor do they let you access the code
(if any); that's the whole point, to give a distribution that users can't
meddle with. I'm not sure how the 2007 splitter wizard operates but splitting
the database and converting to .accde *should* be separate operations.

 

[Repent]

ok, so I opened the original accdb file and made adjustments to forms,
created new forms, etc. I then selected DB tools from the ribbon
(Access2007) and created another accde. After distributing the new
accde file, when it's opened, my new forms are there but none of the
vbs event procedures are working, for example, the forms are supposed
to open to a blank record on the form but they open up to first
record.

In a previous post it was mentioned to open a master copy of the front
end to be able to make changes. I thought that was what I had done.

Any idea what I've done wrong here?

chris

 

[Douglas J. Steele]

Have you ensured that the folder where the ACCDE file exists has been added
to the Trust Center?

See what Jeff Conrad has at http://accessjunkie.com/faq_01.aspx and
http://accessjunkie.com/faq_33.aspx

 

[Repent]

yes. all changes are happening in the same folderthat had been trusted
when the project was setup. I rechecked.

chris

 

[Douglas J. Steele]

I'm missing something. You said "After distributing the new accde file". How
can you be sure where the accde file is located?

 

[Repent]

After creating a accde file (after making changes to forms, etc) I
distribute that file to users desktops and the user runs it from
there. The DB is split and the backend resides on a fileserver.

 

[Repent]

my process from start to finish was:

1. created a DB in access2007 with forms. tables, queries, and
reports.
2. split database
2a created accde file
3. distributed accde frontend to users
4. users using database
5. new forms and tables need to be created
6. open backend in exclusive mode and add tables
7. open original DB and make changes to forms, create new forms based
on new tables added
8. again create a accde file
9. distribute this new file to users
10. open frontend, new forms are there, no vbs code runs

 

[Douglas J. Steele]

And you know for certain that the user's Desktop has been added to the Trust
Center?

 

[Repent]

the user's desktop hadn't been entered before and code was running.
how would you design a frontend for users but yet have to include
their desktop paths into the trust center? that doesn't make sense.

chris

 

[Repent]

tried adding the users desktop path, although it wasn;t needed before.
Still not working. this is really wired

 

[Douglas J. Steele]

It may not make sense to you, but that's the way it is: Access 2007 will
only run code associated with a database if the database is in a trusted
location.

In another post, you say you "tried adding the users desktop path". How did
you do that?

 

[Repent]

Doug;

In the main DB file I went into the trust center and in the trusted
locations section and entered in "C:\documents and
settings\chris.domainname\desktop" and selected the option to also
trust subfolders.

I then created a accde file from the master DB and copied the newely
created frontend/accde file to the desktop of my test workstation.

I wondered about using a wildcard like "%username% in the location
instead of my name but for the sake of testing I haven't tried that
yet.

So on the test machine, the frontend is on the desktop and the path to
the desktop is the one described above.

on the test workstation I have the Access runtime installed. When
double clicking on the frontend on the desktop, it gives a security
warning and I select "ok" and the form opens. The changes I made to
the form are there, just no underlying code is being run.

Sure seems like a permissions or security issue.....

chris

 

[Douglas J. Steele]

The Trust Center is specific to each machine. Just because you set something
as trusted on your machine has no effect on any other machines. If that
wasn't the case, it would be even easier to distribute malicious code.

You could try using the trick Jeff Conrad has in
http://accessjunkie.com/faq_33.aspx

 

[Repent]

Doug;

I tried the trick shown in that article and it does prevent the
warning from coming up. No fix to the problem though.

however, I created a new DB and imported in the elements from the old
DB to see if there were some corruption there. Still no good.

What I'm seeing is that if I operate the original unsplit, un-accde
file, the event procedures work, namely, "on load, after update, on
dirty, on undo"

when I split the DB and create a accde file, then run the accde file,
the event procedures do not run.

all the files were placed in the same place on the network. I also
copied them to my local workstation and re-ran the link manager to fix
the table links. Both places on the network and local machine are
listed in the Trusted Locations.

I've even gone so far as to setup a lab computer, with no network
policies running on it (just to make sure), and I get the same
results.

any other thoughts would be appreciated.

chris

 

[Douglas J. Steele]

Sorry, I haven't seen that problem, so I have no further suggestions.