How to set up a development environment in MS Access

Question

I have created an MS Access 2003 application, set up as a split front-end/back-end configuration, with a user group of about five people. The front end .mdb sits on a network fi

Answer 1

You need to understand that a shared mdb file for the data is not a robust solution. Microsoft would suggest that SQL Server or some other server based database would be a far better solution and would allow you to use the same access front end. The migration wizard would help you make the changeover if you wanted to go that way.

As another uses pointed out, corruption will occur. It is simply a question of how often, not if.

To understand the performance issues you need to understand that to the server the mdb file with the data in it is simply that, a file. Since no code runs on the server, the server does not understand transactions, record locking etc. It simply knows that there is a file that a bunch of people are trying to read and write simultaniously.

With a database system such as SQL Server, Oracle, DB2. MySQL etc. the database program runs on the server and looks to the server like a single program accessing the database file. It is the database program (running on the server) that handles record locking, transactions, concurrency, logging, data backup/recovery and all the other nice things one wants from a database.

Since a database program designed to run on the server is designed to do that and only that, it can do it far better and more efficently that a program like Access reading an writing a shared file (mdb).