how to make DB available to non Access desktops

[David H]

I am so newbie on Databases I am not sure where to even start looking. This
is the scenario, on of the engineers created an Access database that links
old jobs with the equipment used on the job with the design engineers on the
job. The intent being that when junior engineers come into a similar design
situation they can search by equipment/job/engineer and find out who already
has expertise in the area. As new jobs are completed the engineer can add his
experience to the database thus growing the available knowledge base. Great
idea! and works great IF everybody had Access. We didn't by Access for every
desktop, not everybody needs it. What are the best way(s) to have this
database available for all users? thanks in advance for the advice and
suggestions.

 

[golfinray]

Look at Access runtime, which is not a full version but just allows you to
run the database.

 

[David H]

That's a possibility I had not considered, thanks.
The engineer was asking about maybe having it available from a sharepoint
site or something like that. Is that possible?

 

[golfinray]

I think you can download the runtime version at Microsoft's site free or
maybe a very small fee. Some sharepoint site may be available also.

 

[David H]

Yep, I downloaded it and it works great. Thank you again. The gotcha for this
environment is convincing all the other IT guys to push it out to their
users. Which I am sure could be done with some time and a little effort.
I guess what my engineer was hoping for was some way to publish to a web
page or sharepoint site or something that did not require much thought on the
part of the user. A point and click kind of thing. Do you know how that is
done with a SQL backend? I have no clue I am just assuming that there is some
way to do this. but you know where assumption can get ya.
thanks

 

[golfinray]

You could attach rather easily to sql backend over the web. Check into
dsn-less connections. We use Frontpage but I'm sure many other systems would
work equally well.

 

[Klatuu]

With the developer tools which you can also download from the same place you
got the runtime, you can create an installation module that will install the
runtime on a user's computer if it is not already installed and you can
install your application and any other supporting files the application
needs. It is like a startup file.

That file can be put on a shared drive where the users can run it and
accomplish the install.

As to attaching to database engines other than Jet, that is an application
consideration.