Developing Access Database Applications

[Joe Dougherty]

Old timer-develper returning to the drawing board here (from the days of
Access 97)...

Question 1: Does Microsoft still allow (and facilitate) the conversion of
..mde program files into applications that will run outside the Access
environment without any rights or licensing issues?

Question 2: Is it difficult these days to develop small database apps for
MAC users?


Way back in the days of Access 97, converting an Access file into an .mde
file worked to somewhat protect your coding and make it a working
"application".

I read the developers edition for that version many years ago (a great,
comprehensive book, by the way) and it discussed how to go one step farther
by converting the .mde program file into an application that would operate
outside the Access environment. I remember it even discussed how there would
be no copyrights or licensing issues with Microsoft.

Back then, for the studios, I just had them go to the expense of purchasing
a licensed copy of Access for every workstation from which they wanted my app
to run. Now, I'm thinking of developing for many clients outside the studio
walls and I wanted to know if that utility of converting the Access database
still stands in Access 2003.

Thanks for any enlightenment...

(e-mail address removed)

 

[Douglas J. Steele]

Microsoft has never allowed "the conversion of .mde program files into
applications that will run outside the Access environment". MDE files still
require that the user have Access installed on their computer (although it
can be the royalty-free run-time version of Access that came with the
Developer edition of Office in earlier versions, or now comes with Visual
Studio Tools for Office) Tony Toews has a good overview of what's required
at http://www.granite.ab.ca/access/developereditionfaq.htm

There isn't a version of Access for Macs (although it will run under Windows
emulators). Not sure what newsgroup would be appropriate for a question
about database apps for Macs. You might try
microsoft.public.macintosh.general, or microsoft.public.mac.otherproducts

 

[Joe Dougherty]

Thanks, Doug. I had just come across Visual Studio after I posted that
question. It looks like my way to go in this case.

Appreciate it...

 

[John Vinson]

On Sun, 16 Apr 2006 05:52:02 -0700, Joe Dougherty <Joe

Old timer-develper returning to the drawing board here (from the days of
Access 97)...

Question 1: Does Microsoft still allow (and facilitate) the conversion of
.mde program files into applications that will run outside the Access
environment without any rights or licensing issues?

It does not do so now, and it never has done so.

You can instead purchase the appropriate Access Developer's Edition to
allow distribution of a Runtime version of the Access program; this is
royalty-free and will allow users to run (but not to modify) .mdb or
..mde files. You're apparently misremembering how the developer's
edition worked - it doesn't compile the .mde into an executable; it
just provides you with a royalty-free version of the msaccess.exe (and
associated) program file.

See http://www.granite.ab.ca/access/developereditionversions.htm for
the various names under which Microsoft has provided this facility.

Question 2: Is it difficult these days to develop small database apps for
MAC users?

Still just as bad. The Access software is not available in a Mac
edition.

The latest Macs will, however, run Microsoft Windows.


John W. Vinson[MVP]