Question Is it possible to search Word Documents using Access 2007? (1 Viewer)

[JimmyTap]

I’ve been assigned the task of designing a consultant database for my company. We currently pay for an online service, but it's expensive and we don't use all the features it provides anyway. Ideally, I'd like to see if I can replicate the service and features that we do use in the form of a Microsoft Access Database and save our company a little money.

Currently our pay service works in the following way: Each of our consultants has their own individual file with contact information as well as a listing of Word Documents that have been uploaded and attached to their file (a resume, biodata, cover letter). When I am looking to fill a particular position, I simply type in a combination of key words (not in any particular order, it doesn’t seem to matter) into a search-bar at the top of the page. The database then combs my data and the full-text of all attached documents before displaying the names of individuals who had documents that contained all of my search-terms.

Thus far, I’ve been able to use a table with consultant information to produce an organized form that shows the contact info for each individual consultant. I also figured out a way to attach Word documents to a consultant’s file (using the individual’s form). My question is…is it possible to search the contents of a Microsoft Word document (.doc or .docx) within a database using Microsoft Access 2007, and if so, how?

If you know of a template or other example out there, I would love to take a look. Any help is greatly appreciated!

 

[spikepl]

Have you considered things like Google desktop, or WIndows Search4 (free, but XP only, Viste/Win7 have it built in, AFAIK) that indexes desired files? An Access search through free text in piles of docs will necessarily be slow compared to that. Unless you make your own index.

 

[JimmyTap]

I haven't, but I'll definitely check both of those out after I'm done writing this. If I manage to come through with it, the database will be stored on our server for anyone to use (they don't all use XP).

My boss seems to think that Access is the best option, even though I've expressed significant concern about how long it will take to produce search results when the database needs to peruse over 2k word documents.

I don't have any experience indexing, but would be interested in learning more about how to do it. Any suggestions on resources I could use to help me?

 

[spikepl]

Indexing is like a phone book. A phone book is indexed alphabetically. If you search for Mr. Ebenezer Smith, You would theoretically look up in the index where pages with S begin.

An unindexed (and unordered) phone book would require you to scan the entire book to find mr Ebenezer Smith

A brute-force search for a word can take ages, because it has to be compared to ALL data. If an index exists, it will find a match very quickly. ALternatively, you'd have to make your own index - i.e. attach keywords to each document - but then, which keywords?

SQL server has indexing capabilites - maybe it can index Word-docs somehow?


Use google - I m sure there are better explanations out there. And Goolge is itself an example of indexed search. Otherwise it would take millions of years to find what you type into google.

It is possible that Windows Search4 (etc) is callable from an application - last I looked into this I think some stuff could be called from VBA - but it was not simple.

All in all, you can wind up spending a lot of effort for not much benefit, since you already do have a service. I'd recommend checking and updating the Business Case for this entire undertaking.