ADO connection to web

[Park2]

Is there a way to get an ADO connection string to connect to an access
database on a web site.

eg.

www.mydomain.com/database/mydatabase.mdb


Any help or pointers appreciated

SteveW

 

[Albert D.Kallal]

No, you have to be able to "browse to the path name on the disk drive.

Even when you use a odbc, or ado connection, if you look at the string...it
ALWAYS resolves to a file location.

This is because un-like sql server, a mdb file is simply a file.

We can't connect to a Excel file, or a word file..or in fact a jpeg file.
These are simply files sitting on a computer. So, you can no more connect to
a jpeg file then you can to a word, or excel, or in our case a mdb file.

You could in theory setup a VPN connection to that server (if you owned the
server..or the provider allowed a VPN connection). However, while this would
in fact allow you to browse to the file folders (and thus connect to the
file), there are problems of performance and reliability when you do this.

I explain in detail why you don't get reliability here:

http://www.members.shaw.ca/AlbertKallal//Wan/Wans.html

The above also gives some solutions to using ms-access over the internet....

 

[Park2]

Thanks for the info. Is there a way to merge the data from a web MDB to a
local one.

 

[Albert D.Kallal]

Thanks for the info. Is there a way to merge the data from a web MDB to a
local one.

Either you use ftp..and make a COPY of the mdb file on the server, or you
setup a vpn (however, my article does explain that the VPN is not going to
be very reliable). You have to have a means to direct connect to the
file...or simply copy the mdb file down to your computer.

I suppose, you could write some type of web services that your software
connects to. This would assume that your development and programming tools
you currently use are web based..and you run this server yourself....

The fact of the matter is that you never installed access on the server, and
access has little, or nothing to do with the web anyway. Why not just use a
server based back end like sql server, or just about any server based
product. MS-access will connect to sql server, or oracle. A GOOD many web
providers support sql server, or mysql...both of which ms-access can connect
do. You can't install ms-access on the web server anyway, and since you are
not using ms-access on the web server, the using a mdb file on the web
server really reduces your choices here. The amount of trouble to write a
web service to read/write the mdb file, or even setup code to try and
merge/transfer the data to the mdb file sitting on that server is going to
be MORE work then simply using a server based data engine on the web site.
IF you use sql server, then your front end on your computer can connect to
the web server, and transfer data. Most internet providers do allow you to
connect to the sql server running on the web site (you do have to use a
secure (SSL) connection...but they do allow it..and it is simple matter to
link your tables in ms-access to that server on the web site).

 

[Brendan Reynolds]

Re the idea of using a web service. Here's a link to a previous thread on
that subject in the archives ...
http://groups.google.com/group/micr...read/thread/1ac8aaeabc87b473/6c383918a1f33419

And here's a link to a related KB article. This same link is mentioned in
the thread above, but it is tucked away near the end of the thread, so I'll
re-post it here as it might otherwise be overlooked ...
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;316337

I never got the opportunity put this stuff to work in a production
environment, but I did do some 'proof of concept' testing. The results
seemed quite promising at the time.