How do I allow two or more users access to the same File at the same time. I've been using a Windows 98 server with a Microsoft Access 97 database. Every user on the network can access the database at the same time and read & write to it as long as they aren't using the same record. Linux and Samba won't let me do this. I'm using Linux 7.3 and Samba 2.2.7a
Consider using MySQL on the Linux server and MyODBC on the clients. Using access databases in a shared environment can be a real nightmare. Gary Haygood wrote:> How do I allow two or more users access to the same File at the same > time. > I've been using a Windows 98 server with a Microsoft Access 97 > database. Every user on the network can access the database at the > same time and read & write to it as long as they aren't using the same > record. Linux and Samba won't let me do this. > I'm using Linux 7.3 and Samba 2.2.7a >
Why? MySql and MyOBDC are free, and perform much better than Access. You still use access to, well, access the MySQL server. The data sits on the server and MySQL handles the transactions. You can even put MySQL on a windows machine if you want to. It works pretty well that way. I just finished a project that used Access in a multi-user environment. It performed well unless somebody opened the database in exclusive mode. This caused no end of problems. When I switched it over to MySQL and MyOBDC, all the problems went away and the system was far more securable. The users still saw exactly the same access front end that they were used to. MS will tell you that Access can handle up to 256 users, but they are full of it. Go with a real database server instead - your life will be much improved because of it. Been there, done that! Mark Gary Haygood wrote: > I'm kind of stuck with the Access Database. > > At 01:44 PM 12/17/2002 -0500, you wrote: > >> Consider using MySQL on the Linux server and MyODBC on the clients. >> Using access databases in a shared environment can be a real nightmare. >> >> Gary Haygood wrote: >> >>> How do I allow two or more users access to the same File at the same >>> time. >>> I've been using a Windows 98 server with a Microsoft Access 97 >>> database. Every user on the network can access the database at the >>> same time and read & write to it as long as they aren't using the >>> same record. Linux and Samba won't let me do this. >>> I'm using Linux 7.3 and Samba 2.2.7a >> >> >> >> > >
> -----Original Message----- > From: Mark Ehle [mailto:mehle@willard.lib.mi.us]> Why? MySql and MyOBDC are free, and perform much better than > Access. You still use access to, well, access the MySQL server. The data > sits on the server and MySQL handles the transactions. You can even putMySQL on a> windows machine if you want to. It works pretty well that way.I just set this up here. It was a lot of work, because we had some Access table names with spaces in them. (Illegal in MySQL.) The result was I had to rewrite all the queries. The users have been happy with it, though...no more spates of database corruption that result in losing a day or two of work. There *are* some quirks and gotchas with Access and MyODBC. Anyone thinking of doing this should read the FAQs carefully. By itself Access is a toy database. It works fine until you have more than five or six people accessing the file simultaneously, then it fails in nasty ways. This is part of Microsoft's business model -- the database works until it gets big enough to be important to your company, then it fails and they sell you Microsoft SQL Server as a back end.