What does linking a Access table to an SQL table mean?

[BigO]

I evaluating a small application that uses access (8 tables) however my IT
department does not support Access. Can I link the Access tables to SQL
server 2005 tables? Does that actual mean that the data resides in SQL
Server and is inserted, updated or deleted there? Is linking the access
tables to SQL Server tables effectively make the application use SQL Server
as it's DBMS?

 

[Klatuu]

Yes, you can link to SQL Sever using Access as the front end. All the data
then is in SQL Server tables.

But, it isn't really necessary to have your IT department support it. An
Access mdb back end does not need any speacial support. All it needs is to
be on shared folder where the front end users have read/write/delete access.
Access is different from SQL Server. SQL Server is a Client Server database
engine and Access is a File Server database engine. The actual database
engine is Jet, but is uses the backend mdb for its data.

With SQL Server, the database engine is running on a server using the
server's processor and memory. When you issue a request to SQL Server, the
processing is done on the server and the results and or data is returned
through an ODBC connection.
With Access, the Jet database engine is running on the client computer along
with the front end application mdb. It is only the data in the back end mdb
that is on a shared folder.
Therefore, it doesn't take any special installation or managment to use an
mdb backed database. All you have to do is use the Access Linked Table
manager to tell the front end application where the back end data mdb resides.

 

[Guest]

I evaluating a small application that uses access (8 tables) however my IT
department does not support Access. Can I link the Access tables to SQL
server 2005 tables?

Yes, if you have permission and know how.

Does that actual mean that the data resides in SQL
Server and is inserted, updated or deleted there?
Yes

Is linking the access
tables to SQL Server tables effectively make the application use SQL Server
as it's DBMS?

Yes

(david)