Copying database to CD/Drive D:

[George Reamy]

I am having an odd little problem. I need to copy an
Access database to drive D so that I can consult with
another member of my outfit. When I copy it to my
Memorex CD-RW in Drive D, it always, always comes
out "read only." I can't uncheck the attribute under
properties, either. FYI, I'm running an XP Home edition
system and using MS Access 2002.

How can I copy the file to Drive D so my colleague and I
can make changes that I can bring home and copy to my own
hard drive?

Thanks!

--George

 

[Cheryl Fischer]

George,

That is the default, expected behavior. Your colleague will need to copy
the read-only file to his computer, change the read-only property, make his
changes and then copy it back to you.

One thing you and your colleague might want to consider, is using WinZip or
another compression utility, to zip up the database. If it is not too, too
large, you could email your databases back and forth.

 

[Wayne Morgan]

CD-ROM drives are read only. The only way around this is to use a utility, such as Direct
CD or Drag-to-Disk, in Easy CD Creator. Other companies make similar utilities. You would
then use this utility to format a CDRW (not a CD-R) disk for drag and drop access.
However, this would be very slow to work off of. I would recommend using a CDRW disk, copy
the file to the disk and take it to your friend's computer. Copy the file off of the CDRW
to your friend's hard drive and make sure the read only attribute is removed. Make the
changes you want to make, then write the file back to the CDRW disk. If you don't have a
utility similar to that mentioned above, you will need to erase the CDRW before writing
the changed file to it.

 

[Sue Sutton]

Wayne,

Why can't a CD-R be formatted for for drag and drop access?

Thanks!

Sue

 

[Bruce M. Thompson]

In my experience, sharing a writable CD (CD-RW *or* CD-R, if you're using
DirectCD, or a similar utility) between machines is asking for disaster. The
problem is similar as for floppy drives, only worse - if the heads on one
CDWriter is off even a tiny bit from the track written to by the other CDWriter,
it will likely render the disk unreadable. Formatting before writing anew seems
to be the safest approach (even erasing won't offset the track alignment
problem), so that may only apply to CD-RWs regardless of what software you are
using. This would require that you copy the file from the CD-RW to your hard
drive, make your modifications to the file, format the CD-RW and then copy the
file back to the CD-RW.

Of course, CD-Rs are getting cheaper, so burning a *new* CD after making your
modifications might be a viable option. I still deliver application updates on 3
media formats (zipped to floppy, copied to Zip Disk and burned to CD) just to be
on the safe side.

 

[Albert D. Kallal]

Actually, you can do that. The problem with setting up direct cd on a cd-r
in place of a cd-rw is that the other user MAY NOT have direct cd setup.
That being the case, they might well not be able to read the cd-r.

A lot of people don't realize that direct cd can be used on a cd-r, and it
supports drag and drop, and even deleting!. Of course all the while what
direct cd does in this case is fool you, and actually continues uses up
space until the disk is no longer useable.

If you use direct cd with a cd-rw, then you don't have this problem (the cd
will re-use and re-claim the disk space, so in effect it is a 500 meg floppy
disk!). However, you are correct that a cd-r can be used with direct cd, and
the files are fully read and writeable when you do this. (you can even open
word files on the cd-r and change them
and save them!).

In fact, I prefer to burn the cd-r using the standard cd burner software, as
this is readable on any pc without additional software. However, any file
copied from a cd-r in this fashion is marked as read only, and the flag must
un-checked AFTER you copy the file to your computer. You can re-use the cd-r
over and over just like a floppy in this case. Eventually, over time, the
cd-r is filled. So, even if you only use the cd-r to copy "one" file, you
can do this over and over until the cd is actually full, but you will only
see the one file. Since cd-r are so cheap, they tend to be thought of a
disposable floppy disk...just like a disposable razor.

 

[Sue]

Albert,

Enlightening and very helpful!! Thanks.

I use Easy CD Creator

More questions:
1. What is the standard cd burner software you mention?

2. Can a CD-R be formatted and will it then support drag and drop and deleting?

3. Why does a CD-R fill up? Why can't you delete the files on the CD-R?

4. Sometimes I will get a CD-R to work on my desktop which has a CDRW drive and
I will be able to drag and drop in Windows Explorer. But if I take that same
CD-R and put it in my laptop which only has a standard CDROM drive, ii can't be
read there. Why is that?

Thanks.

Sue

 

[Albert D. Kallal]

Albert,

Enlightening and very helpful!! Thanks.

I use Easy CD Creator

More questions:
1. What is the standard cd burner software you mention?

Well, in place of using direct CD which supports drag and droop, you fire up
the cd-creator software. So, the standard software in your case would be
Easy CD creator.

2. Can a CD-R be formatted and will it then support drag and drop and

deleting?

Yes, it can formatted this way, but as mentioned, I prefer to se option #1
(create a data cd. Most don't realise that you can create a data cd over and
over with the SAME cd-r...it will just have less room each time).

3. Why does a CD-R fill up? Why can't you delete the files on the CD-R?

The cd-r is a write only media. Further, the way it works is that there is a
chemical dye that changes color when the laser hits it. So, you can only
burn ONCE to the same spot, and after that it is READ ONLY! So, in fact, if
you modify a file on a cd-r, what is does is COPY the modified file to a NEW
location on the CD. This "copying" process fools you into thinking that the
cd-r is readable and writeable. However, it is only write once able. So,
when you delete a file on the cd-r, what happens is a copy of the
"directory" of files is made the that one file is simply left out of this
new directory copy. (you don't get the free space back, all you get is a dir
with the file left out!). Thus, over time, the cd-r will eventually fill up
and NO new space can be found on the disk.

a cd-rw is actually a read and writable media. It can be used over and over
(actually only a few hundred times). In place of a chemical dye of the cd-r,
the cd-rw has a substance that is magnetic and is heated up by the laser.
The cd-rw then changes this magnetic substance with a real magnetic head
like a hard disk. The result is similar to a cd-r, but it can be used over
and over since we are not using a chemical dye anymore.

4. Sometimes I will get a CD-R to work on my desktop which has a CDRW drive and
I will be able to drag and drop in Windows Explorer. But if I take that same
CD-R and put it in my laptop which only has a standard CDROM drive, ii can't be
read there. Why is that?

There is two possible reasons for this:
1) the cd drive is very very old. Cd drives that are less then 4x speed
generally CAN NOT read cd-r. You usually need a multi-sync 16X or greater to
read rw, and 4x for most cd-r's. cd-r are the most compatible (some 1x
readers will read them).

2) By using drag and drop in place of the "create data cd" software, you
created a direct CD, and usually the target pc needs some drivers to read
direct cd. So, try using the easy cd creator and crate a data cd, it will
likely be readable on the target pc. Only windows 2000 and later has the
direct cd read ability built in. If you are using win98 or earlier, you need
to install a driver to read the special direct cd.

Remember, you do NOT have to use direct-cd on the cd-r. As mentioned, I
don't, since any direct cd must have some software on the target pc to use
this direct cd. In fact, often I use a cd-rw, and STILL DO NOT use direct
cd. Remember, direct CD is a special format. You can use the "standard"
format for both cd-r, and cd-rw's. (use the create data cd in Easy).