Best way to give end users access to database?

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BadBoy House

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• Mar 27, 2019

• #1

We have almost finished testing our database and will be looking to go live with it soon.

In terms of preparing the database for end user access (approx. 50 people on and off) is it best practice to leave the database in .accdb format and for users to load it via Access on their own workstation, or should the database be converted into an .exe so that it can be run independently from Access?

any help much appreciated.

 

theDBguy

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• Mar 27, 2019

• #2

Hi. Unfortunately, there is no way I am aware of to convert an ACCDB into an independent EXE file. As for best practice, it is recommended to distribute your database as a ACCDE file.

 

isladogs

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• Mar 27, 2019

• #3

Agree with the previous comments
What you can do is distribute your database & other related files as an EXE file for installation on another PC.
However it is not possible to run the database without using a copy of Access - full or runtime

 

B

BadBoy House

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• Mar 27, 2019

• #4

Many thanks for the replies. Makes sense that Access itself is required.

Cheers

 

The_Doc_Man

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• Mar 27, 2019

• #5

I believe that if you have the Access Runtime file available (also called MSACCESS.EXE, unfortunately - so it can be confusing...), you can create an .ACCDE file and the run-time version is legally distributable. Only the developer needs a legal full copy of Access.

However, you need to do extra testing on the .ACCDE and Runtime combination because there are a few "gotcha" cases that sometimes crop up for that pairing that would NOT show up for the developer copy of Access and the .ACCDB version of the app.

 

gemma-the-husky

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• Apr 3, 2019

• #6

out of interest, you can either install access runtime, or install full access and not licence it, and it will revert to runtime after a short period/number of uses.

you can simulate the runtime environment by changing the file extension to accdr, rather than accde or accdb.

 

D

deletedT

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• Apr 4, 2019

• #7

gemma-the-husky said:

install full access and not licence it, and it will revert to runtime after a short period/number of uses.

Click to expand...

I didn't know that.
Thanks for the tip.

 

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CJ_London

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• Apr 5, 2019

• #8

.accdr is vital to use as a developer for testing if there is any chance a user is going to be using access runtime.

To my mind the most useful feature lost in runtime is shortcut menus (right click to sort/filter etc). You can build replacements. Also lost is the spellchecker.

You also need to ensure your code has strong error management. Runtime will not generate a detailed error message, just a generic 'there is an error' message, and then close