Outlook Access permission

[Joe]

I have an Access 2000 database, which automatically sends
e-mail reports via e-mail. This works fine apart from
Outlook requesting permission for Access to do this. I
would like to set my database up as a trusted source and
eliminate this message. Making the application totally
independent of user intervention. Do I need to set up
digital signature, if so how? Or is their another method I
should use to stop the requests.

Many Thanks for any support.

Joe.

 

[Rob Schneider]

Takes a bit more computing configuration and maybe a programming change,
but have you thought of eliminating use of Outlook? Setup the Access
program to send mail via SMTP server. XP Professional has one included
(installed with the IIS web server). Or send direct to an SMPT server
available to you on a network device somewhere.

Outlook is a terrific program for people to use... but it's not optimum
when trying to setup automated things like this for computers (not
people) to use.

Hope this is useful to you. Let us know.

rms

 

[Guest]

Hi Rob,
Many thanks for your support and suggestions. I was
following up your suggestions and looking for information
on setting up access to send messages via SMTP server when
I stumbled across the Express Soft site:
http://www.express-soft.com/mailmate/clickyes.html that
provides a programming solution for the pop up messages. I
have installed this and it appears to solve the problem.
There is also some code supplied to switch the programme
on before the send and off after the send. Would you use
this solution? Or are their security implications.
Regards
Joe

 

[Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]]

Hi Rob,
Many thanks for your support and suggestions. I was
following up your suggestions and looking for information
on setting up access to send messages via SMTP server when
I stumbled across the Express Soft site:
http://www.express-soft.com/mailmate/clickyes.html that
provides a programming solution for the pop up messages. I
have installed this and it appears to solve the problem.
There is also some code supplied to switch the programme
on before the send and off after the send. Would you use
this solution? Or are their security implications.

Yes, in that if you get infected with a mail-borne virus and have
'expressclickyes' running, it will be able to access your address book and
send out viruses without your knowledge. I think Rob's idea is a much better
one unless there is some particular reason you need to use Outlook.

 

[Rob Schneider]

As Lanwench mentioned, a better approach is to send the mail direct from
the Access application. You can buy tools to do this, or you can add
the commands yourself. I took a quick look in Access 2003 help file and
I don't see any mail handling functions. They only talk about sending
mail with a mail client, e.g. Outlook. A mystery why they don't provide
functions to use an SMTP server. Or maybe by looking harder you can find
the calling functions.

Without thinking about this too hard, without it being in native Access
the way I would consider add mail sending to Access (without buying 3rd
party add-ins) in relatively simple way would be to install the Python
programming langauge on the computer. By installing this you get
automatically (and for free) a lot of mail hanlding capability. Make a
short Python program to send mail based on system arguments. In Access
build up the arguments (to, from, message, attachment file names), then
call this Python program to send the mail.

Dozens of other ways to lick this problem. This just what comes to mind
quickest and is inexpensive and relatively easy.

Hope this is useful to you. Let us know.

rms

 

[Joe]

Thanks to both yourself and Lanwench for the information.
I would really liked to have been able to send these
reports from Access directly either via Outlook or via our
smtp server (VPOP3 which is protected on both client and
gateway), but have not been able to find any info on
acheiving this without user intervention. It looks like
Python is another learning curve that I must address.

 

[Rob Schneider]

I mentioned Python simply because (a) it's free from www.python.org, (b)
it provides the smtp libraries that simply work, (c) the code can to do
it can be done in about 10 lines ... but you should make it a bit longer
to put in exception testing, (d) the Python documentation on the smtp
functions has examples which make it relatively easy to see how to do
this and (e) it will work and even better it will look as if it's wrking
direct from Access. You can also probably buy 3rd party add-ins, and
use other programming infrastructures, e.g. Perl (which I find
impossible to figure out, but many love it).

You *will* be using your SMTP server. It's just that you won't be using
built-in Access capability since Access doesn't (to my knowledge)
provide this. This is why they do provide a way to call other
exeutables from within Access.

Access needs functions to call email handling cpabilties. However, to
the best of my knowledge it's not available in Access as delivered from
Microsoft. Oh well, thank goodness for the alternatives and Access's
ability to use those alternatives. Good luck.

Given the alternatives, I'd avoid using Outlook for any sore of
automation. It's an end-user tool. (Despite that I've seen many
corporate-types try to use Outlook on servers for automating ... it was
from watching this I learned and sought other ways to do what I thought
they should have known.)

rms

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

In additioin to Joe's suggestion, you can also use the CDO for Windows
library in Windows 2000 and 2003 to create and send messages through an SMTP
server.

--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of
Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for
Administrators, Power Users, and Developers