object dependency doesn't work / apprear on the View pulldown menu

[WylieCoyote]

I'm using Access 2003 on a .mdb database created in a Access 2000 format. I
have gone to the Tools>Options>General>NameAutoCorrect and have selected all
three options to activate the features needed to utilized the Object
Dependencies. Nothing has been imported. When I go to the "View" tab on the
tool bar no "Object Dependencies option is displayed. I've watched the "OD"
video demo - while moderately entertaining it gives no trouble shooting
information.

 

[Tom Wickerath]

I have not watched the "OD" video, as I'm still using Access 2002, but I suggest updating the
"name maps" for the objects in your database. This is accomplished by opening each object (table,
query, form, report, etc.) in design view and then saving the object.

Tom
_____________________________________


I'm using Access 2003 on a .mdb database created in a Access 2000 format. I
have gone to the Tools>Options>General>NameAutoCorrect and have selected all
three options to activate the features needed to utilized the Object
Dependencies. Nothing has been imported. When I go to the "View" tab on the
tool bar no "Object Dependencies option is displayed. I've watched the "OD"
video demo - while moderately entertaining it gives no trouble shooting
information.

 

[WylieCoyote]

Thanks for getting back to me. I read about these and other recommendations
in Access 2003 on line help for trouble shooting object dependencies. One of
which deleted the Name maps (removing the check for the option) and then
checking the box to turn them on. The latter on caused Access to go 90-100%
CPU bound for 4-6 hours. Ouch!

I had hoped for less than the 90 minute exercise it will take to open in
design view, save and close each object. Some of my crosstabs+Maketables
take 5+ minutes to open in Designview on a Win2K 2.5 GHZ machine with .5gb of
memory and lots of disks and space.

Since the "Object Dependencies" option is not even appearing on the pull
down "View" menu (in bold or grey) I believe the problem may go deeper in
Access's design. Access has the bad habit of leaving around broken object
aritifacts and not cleaning them up or flagging them as errors.
Thanks for the help,
Wylie C.

 

[Tom Wickerath]

Hi Wylie,

Something is seriously wrong if it takes 5+ minutes to open any query in design view, especially
with the PC you described. Do you have a LOT of applications running at the same time?

I would start by cleaning out the temp files folder, which is likely:
C:\Documents and Settings\UserName\Local Settings\Temp

where UserName is your logon name (it may be "administrator" if you are logging on as the admin).
Note that the Local Settings folder is normally hidden, but you can display it by setting an
option in Windows Explorer: Tools > Folder Options... Click on the View tab and select the
option button to "Show hidden files and folders".

I'd also clean out the Temporary Internet Files folder:
C:\Documents and Settings\UserName\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files

and run a compact and repair on your Access database(s), after backing them up. Also compact the
folders used to store mail messages (Outlook Express) or compact the .PST file used to store
messages (Outlook). Then I would do a defrag of the hard drive.

Finally, I think I even go so far as to try creating a brand new Access database, and importing
each group of objects (tables, queries, forms, reports, etc.) one group at a time. You'll need to
reset any startup options and ensure that the references are the same. Then see if your queries
still take this long to open in design view.


Tom

___________________________________


Thanks for getting back to me. I read about these and other recommendations
in Access 2003 on line help for trouble shooting object dependencies. One of
which deleted the Name maps (removing the check for the option) and then
checking the box to turn them on. The latter on caused Access to go 90-100%
CPU bound for 4-6 hours. Ouch!

I had hoped for less than the 90 minute exercise it will take to open in
design view, save and close each object. Some of my crosstabs+Maketables
take 5+ minutes to open in Designview on a Win2K 2.5 GHZ machine with .5gb of
memory and lots of disks and space.

Since the "Object Dependencies" option is not even appearing on the pull
down "View" menu (in bold or grey) I believe the problem may go deeper in
Access's design. Access has the bad habit of leaving around broken object
aritifacts and not cleaning them up or flagging them as errors.
Thanks for the help,
Wylie C.

 

['69 Camaro]

Hi.

Since the "Object Dependencies" option is not even appearing on the pull
down "View" menu (in bold or grey) I believe the problem may go deeper in
Access's design.

In addition to Tom's advice, I'd like to add a question for you. Do you
have a table, query, form or report selected in the Database Window when you
select the View menu? If not, the "Object Dependencies" option doesn't show
up on the View menu in Access 2003. And yes, this is "by design," not an
"undocumented feature."

HTH.

Gunny

See http://www.QBuilt.com for all your database needs.
See http://www.Access.QBuilt.com for Microsoft Access tips.

(Please remove ZERO_SPAM from my reply E-mail address, so that a message
will be forwarded to me.)

 

[Tom Wickerath]

PS. A friend offered a few other possibilities for the slowness you experience opening queries:

"Betcha he's pulling the database from across the network, a heavy network load, the database
isn't split, the database is shared, Subdatasheet Names is set to [Auto] on all tables, and the
database file is located at least four or five subdirectories down from the root directory on the
server (sounds like more). A fast computer on his end with plenty of memory and disk space will
not help enough in this scenario."

Tell me you're not doing this....

Tom
_________________________________


Hi Wylie,

Something is seriously wrong if it takes 5+ minutes to open any query in design view, especially
with the PC you described. Do you have a LOT of applications running at the same time?

I would start by cleaning out the temp files folder, which is likely:
C:\Documents and Settings\UserName\Local Settings\Temp

where UserName is your logon name (it may be "administrator" if you are logging on as the admin).
Note that the Local Settings folder is normally hidden, but you can display it by setting an
option in Windows Explorer: Tools > Folder Options... Click on the View tab and select the
option button to "Show hidden files and folders".

I'd also clean out the Temporary Internet Files folder:
C:\Documents and Settings\UserName\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files

and run a compact and repair on your Access database(s), after backing them up. Also compact the
folders used to store mail messages (Outlook Express) or compact the .PST file used to store
messages (Outlook). Then I would do a defrag of the hard drive.

Finally, I think I even go so far as to try creating a brand new Access database, and importing
each group of objects (tables, queries, forms, reports, etc.) one group at a time. You'll need to
reset any startup options and ensure that the references are the same. Then see if your queries
still take this long to open in design view.


Tom

___________________________________


Thanks for getting back to me. I read about these and other recommendations
in Access 2003 on line help for trouble shooting object dependencies. One of
which deleted the Name maps (removing the check for the option) and then
checking the box to turn them on. The latter on caused Access to go 90-100%
CPU bound for 4-6 hours. Ouch!

I had hoped for less than the 90 minute exercise it will take to open in
design view, save and close each object. Some of my crosstabs+Maketables
take 5+ minutes to open in Designview on a Win2K 2.5 GHZ machine with .5gb of
memory and lots of disks and space.

Since the "Object Dependencies" option is not even appearing on the pull
down "View" menu (in bold or grey) I believe the problem may go deeper in
Access's design. Access has the bad habit of leaving around broken object
aritifacts and not cleaning them up or flagging them as errors.
Thanks for the help,
Wylie C.

 

[WylieCoyote]

Tom,
I've clean out the Temp files, the disk isn't fragmented, disk I/O is very
low, plenty of real memory and page file space. I opened a new blank DB and
copied in the exiting Db a group (tables, queries...) at a time. The object
dependencies menu entry still fails to appear. This is a solid bug I
believe. Also opening individual objects (in Design view), saving them and
closing them had no effect on getting object dependencies to work. All the
appropriate "General options Name associated stuff was turned on". ( I
skipped the .pst files - couldn't understand the connection between mail
accounts and .mdb files.)

Also opening Design View on Make table Queries' that:
have two cross tabs queries as input, both of which extract data from a very
large table are absolute pigs with nothing else running on the machine.
These MT queries, when opened in Design View, use in excess of 5 minutes of
"CPU" time to open the query and about 2 minutes and 10 seconds to close it.
Using the "Build" expression in Design View also is a pig if you use any
field in the XTab queries to build a new data item in the table being
constructed in the Make Table .

The DB and the copy of Access 2003 I'm running all are on the machine I'm
logged onto. There is no network access or traffic. I've tried it across a
netwrok and it's not too bad if I need to mow the yard or wash the car
between inputs.

It would appear that Access actually executes the Xtab queries as part of
referencing them in Design View. This might be associated with Access
needing information about the upstream queries that is only available at late
binding, i.e. interpreted on execution. Access appears to wait until the end
of the upstream queries execution to capture the data it needs before opening
the current query being accessed in Design View. When I open the upstream
Xtabs in design view they come up almost instantaneously. Yet when I
reference them from a subsequent dependent query it's oink oink city. Also,
if you want to stop Access completely just use a calculated field as part of
one of the three primary control/sort/filter fields in a cross table build.
I have resorted to doing some field (colume) catonation to allow me to do 4
fields in crosstabs. (I.e. Customer # and SR #, take Cust # integer field
and multiply it by 1024 and add SR # integer to it, SR # always has a value
less that 1000. I use Vbasic public functions to do the compression and post
XTab decompression. I've learned my lesson on using anything past 2 x 2 in
Access. All of the above performance and math issues appeared in Access 2002
and 2003. Object dependencies appears to be 2003 marketing typo / hypo...

I'm going to try build a new two table two query test DB to see it object
dependencies actually work. I'm not holding my breath.

Thanks for the input,
Wylie C

 

[WylieCoyote]

A couple of additional things. The Access data path is
L:\Test\Sales\Sales.mdb
The application works great when executing after the tables are built. The
database isn't shared, isn't split, queries and data in one mdb file on
sales.mdb, single user only, no subdata sheets are used, Subdata sheets were
set to "Auto" on the tables..... I'll change all of these. Sales.mdb is
205MB in size after compaction.

PS. A friend offered a few other possibilities for the slowness you experience opening queries:

"Betcha he's pulling the database from across the network, a heavy network load, the database
isn't split, the database is shared, Subdatasheet Names is set to [Auto] on all tables, and the
database file is located at least four or five subdirectories down from the root directory on the
server (sounds like more). A fast computer on his end with plenty of memory and disk space will
not help enough in this scenario."

Tell me you're not doing this....

Tom
_________________________________


Hi Wylie,

Something is seriously wrong if it takes 5+ minutes to open any query in design view, especially
with the PC you described. Do you have a LOT of applications running at the same time?

I would start by cleaning out the temp files folder, which is likely:
C:\Documents and Settings\UserName\Local Settings\Temp

where UserName is your logon name (it may be "administrator" if you are logging on as the admin).
Note that the Local Settings folder is normally hidden, but you can display it by setting an
option in Windows Explorer: Tools > Folder Options... Click on the View tab and select the
option button to "Show hidden files and folders".

I'd also clean out the Temporary Internet Files folder:
C:\Documents and Settings\UserName\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files

and run a compact and repair on your Access database(s), after backing them up. Also compact the
folders used to store mail messages (Outlook Express) or compact the .PST file used to store
messages (Outlook). Then I would do a defrag of the hard drive.

Finally, I think I even go so far as to try creating a brand new Access database, and importing
each group of objects (tables, queries, forms, reports, etc.) one group at a time. You'll need to
reset any startup options and ensure that the references are the same. Then see if your queries
still take this long to open in design view.


Tom

___________________________________


Thanks for getting back to me. I read about these and other recommendations
in Access 2003 on line help for trouble shooting object dependencies. One of
which deleted the Name maps (removing the check for the option) and then
checking the box to turn them on. The latter on caused Access to go 90-100%
CPU bound for 4-6 hours. Ouch!

I had hoped for less than the 90 minute exercise it will take to open in
design view, save and close each object. Some of my crosstabs+Maketables
take 5+ minutes to open in Designview on a Win2K 2.5 GHZ machine with .5gb of
memory and lots of disks and space.

Since the "Object Dependencies" option is not even appearing on the pull
down "View" menu (in bold or grey) I believe the problem may go deeper in
Access's design. Access has the bad habit of leaving around broken object
aritifacts and not cleaning them up or flagging them as errors.
Thanks for the help,
Wylie C.

I have not watched the "OD" video, as I'm still using Access 2002, but I suggest updating the
"name maps" for the objects in your database. This is accomplished by opening each object (table,
query, form, report, etc.) in design view and then saving the object.

Tom
_____________________________________


I'm using Access 2003 on a .mdb database created in a Access 2000 format. I
have gone to the Tools>Options>General>NameAutoCorrect and have selected all
three options to activate the features needed to utilized the Object
Dependencies. Nothing has been imported. When I go to the "View" tab on the
tool bar no "Object Dependencies option is displayed. I've watched the "OD"
video demo - while moderately entertaining it gives no trouble shooting
information.

 

[WylieCoyote]

Tom,
I created a new small database in Access 2003 format. All objects were new,
no imports. Object dependencies still don't appear on the pull down menu
with any or none of the objects selected.

Bottom line - Access has a bug..
Thanks,
WylieC

 

[Tom Wickerath]

Or perhaps your installation has a problem....

As I stated earlier, I do not have Access 2003, so I will defer any further questions to someone
else that is running this version.


By the way, I am told by an authorative source that there's no "i" in Wyle. Here's a web site
you might enjoy:
http://frogstar.com/wav/tv-wyle-beepbeep.asp


Tom
___________________________________


Tom,
I created a new small database in Access 2003 format. All objects were new,
no imports. Object dependencies still don't appear on the pull down menu
with any or none of the objects selected.

Bottom line - Access has a bug..
Thanks,
WylieC

 

['69 Camaro]

Hi.

Did you happen to upgrade from an earlier version of Access? Apparently,
there's an issue with Access 2003-specific items not showing up on the menus
after an upgrade to Access 2003. Here's the MS KB article describing this
bug:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?id=833219

You mentioned in an earlier post that the database path is
L:\Test\Sales\Sales.mdb, but you also mentioned that the database is on the
PC you log into. Not many computers have an "L:\" drive that isn't a mapped
network drive. Would you please confirm that this is a hard disk connected
as a slave drive or a partition on your PC's hard disk? Or is it an
external drive attached to your PC through a port? The latter would slow
things down as much as, or more than, querying an Access database located on
a network shared drive.

Your descriptions of your queries indicate performance tuning is in order.
Even with performance tuning though, Access may not be the tool for the job,
but a client/server database could be, even on your small database. Do you
have access to a client/server database for these tables and queries, or is
Jet your only option?

HTH.

Gunny

See http://www.QBuilt.com for all your database needs.
See http://www.Access.QBuilt.com for Microsoft Access tips.

(Please remove ZERO_SPAM from my reply E-mail address, so that a message
will be forwarded to me.)