Using MS Access in ADO.NET - coming from VB6

  • Thread starter Thread starter Garry
  • Start date Start date
G

Garry

One of the annoying problems of distributing my VB6 MS Access orientated
financial application to paying customers was that there were many problems
with the MDac installations which caused the application to crash..
Mostly they could be solved by telling the customer to download the latest
MDac and installing it.
Others were not so lucky and our application was discarded on that computer.
If, when re-writing code in VB.NET, I use similar code to make an ADODB
connection and then use the .NET objects, DataTable, DataSet and Adapter
etc, is all the 'behind' support coming from the DOTNET FrameWork??? Is it
independant of any MDac installations?????
In other words, am I still going to have the same problems with Data Access
in DOTNET which are caused by inncorrectly installed or incompatible ADO
components????
I do not want to use SQL!

Garry
 
Garry,

You will have exactly the same problems.

By using ADODB you have imported that in your dotNet environment. It will
even not help if others start to advice you to use SQLExpress. Your problem
stays the same, first try to go to real ADONET.

(And than it is better to go direct to SQLExpress, but that is what you
wrote you did not want)

Just my opinion,

Cor
 
Golly - Cor - that woz kwik.

Thanks for the reply.

Please advise me where I must link-to to see code using pure ADONET to
access MS Access in code. Preferrably VB.NET

Installing SQLExpress on a client machine would make my product
un-attractive to the type of customer I cater to and, having had years of
experience of Microsoft's wonders, I leave SQL to the type of customer who
has the financial resources to buy a considerably more expensive product
where the deal involves a 'computer person' arriving at his/her premisis to
install the application on his/her machine/s.

I market mine in a box.

But thank you very much for making it completely clear.

Microsoft want me to stop using VB6 and re-write my app in VB.NET.
Converting automatically is just not an option.

MS Access, while supported, is not really advised and material on an MDI
application on how to re-size child forms to fit the parent ClientRectangle
is nowhere to be found.


Garry
 
Garry,

Our site is filled with it AdoNet, have first a look at the tab adonet and
than oledb.

http://www.vb-tips.com/default.aspx

In the MDI forms I am not real an expert (not a dummy as well), but going to
the newsgroup
Microsoft.public.dotnet.languages.vb will certainly lead you to guys who can
help you better than me in that.

However, when you are using AdoNet there is not much difference between
OleDb and SQLClient or OracleClient etc.

I hope this helps,

Cor
 
Cor is right, but there is another choice for a secure DBMS engine that even
my daughter Fred could install: SQL Server 2005 Compact Edition. It can be
installed by copying the DLLs along with the application DLLs and other
executables directly to the user's system. The Compact Edition (the DBMS
formerly known as SQL Everywhere, SQL Mobile and SQLCE) is a lightweight
DBMS engine that is fully encryptable and not subject to the shared file or
MDAC issues you'll encounter with JET (the Access DBMS). It's a single-user
DBMS that strips off the features that only multi-user or larger database
DBMSs require so its very (very) fast. It can be programmed in many ways
similar to SqlClient. I'm working on a new property management application
based on it. It's also free. It should be released next week along with my
EBook on the subject. See www.hitchhikerguides.net for more information.

--
____________________________________
William (Bill) Vaughn
Author, Mentor, Consultant
Microsoft MVP
INETA Speaker
www.betav.com/blog/billva
www.betav.com
Please reply only to the newsgroup so that others can benefit.
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
__________________________________
Visit www.hitchhikerguides.net to get more information on my latest book:
Hitchhiker's Guide to Visual Studio and SQL Server (7th Edition)
Between now and Nov. 6th 2006 you can sign up for a substantial discount.
Look for the "Early Bird" discount checkbox on the registration form...
 
First - thank you for answering my post

I, as a new .NET programmer, am rather sceptical about anything new from
Microsoft and its claims are often forgotten after a relatively short period
of time. Remember the Microsoft promise to make a fully compatible Dot NET
framework available for other operating systems, Linux for instance or Mac
computers making the DotNET languages fully cross platform.

I have yet to see one of these announced.

That SQL Server 2005 Compact Edition is free is good.

That it can be easily installed simply by copying DLLs to the target machine
is good. (Yet to be tested and seen)

Duz it have a utility that will let me see the tables and their content or
must I write an appropriate generic utility for this.

Is there a utility to define tables - as in MS Access.

First editions from Microsoft are, sadly, usually half-baked and I need a
mature data base to re-write/base my very much data orientated application.

Why is Microsoft not fully supporting MS Access - a mature and well tried
data base which is excellent for stand-alone applications as mine is.

Thanks again for your suggestion. I do not reject it - I am just skeptical
of the claims and rather disheartened at finding constant obsticals to
re-writing my large VB6 application in DotNET.

Garry
 
Garry said:
First - thank you for answering my post
[snip]

Why is Microsoft not fully supporting MS Access - a mature and well tried
data base which is excellent for stand-alone applications as mine is.
Click to expand...

Because:

1. Access db's have a 2gb size limit
2. Access is not ACID compliant
3. The Access database engine is 15 years old.

The fact that MS has supported Access this long goes above and beyond for a
software company, IMO. Access is dead, though, and its time to move onto
better technologies.

If you want a single-file self-contained and free database engine for
single-users, give SQLite a try. There are many gui's for it as well as
conversion tools to migrate existing databases from Access and other
sources. You'll find COM-based wrappers, OleDb providers, ADO.NET providers
and many other bridges on their website as well:

http://www.sqlite.org

Robert
 
Thanks.

Well, I iz more that 15 years old too an I iz still going strong.

Two Giga iz plenty big enough for my desktop application, even in extremis.

I dont know what ACID is.

I have looked thru the book at
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...E8-175B-46EA-86A0-C9DACAA84C85&displaylang=en
which is based on the "Anywhere" SQL database and I will give it a try.

I'll look at SQL light as well because Microsoft solutions tend to be on the
heavy side while claiming to be on the light side.

Thanks for the advice and answers

Garry


Robert Simpson said:
Garry said:
First - thank you for answering my post
[snip]

Why is Microsoft not fully supporting MS Access - a mature and well tried
data base which is excellent for stand-alone applications as mine is.
Click to expand...

Because:

1. Access db's have a 2gb size limit
2. Access is not ACID compliant
3. The Access database engine is 15 years old.

The fact that MS has supported Access this long goes above and beyond for
a software company, IMO. Access is dead, though, and its time to move
onto better technologies.

If you want a single-file self-contained and free database engine for
single-users, give SQLite a try. There are many gui's for it as well as
conversion tools to migrate existing databases from Access and other
sources. You'll find COM-based wrappers, OleDb providers, ADO.NET
providers and many other bridges on their website as well:

http://www.sqlite.org

Robert
Click to expand...
 
ACID: http://databases.about.com/od/specificproducts/a/acid.htm
Thanks.

Well, I iz more that 15 years old too an I iz still going strong.

Two Giga iz plenty big enough for my desktop application, even in extremis.

I dont know what ACID is.

I have looked thru the book at
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...E8-175B-46EA-86A0-C9DACAA84C85&displaylang=en
which is based on the "Anywhere" SQL database and I will give it a try.

I'll look at SQL light as well because Microsoft solutions tend to be on the
heavy side while claiming to be on the light side.

Thanks for the advice and answers

Garry


Robert Simpson said:
Garry said:
First - thank you for answering my post
[snip]

Why is Microsoft not fully supporting MS Access - a mature and well tried
data base which is excellent for stand-alone applications as mine is.
Click to expand...
Because:

1. Access db's have a 2gb size limit
2. Access is not ACID compliant
3. The Access database engine is 15 years old.

The fact that MS has supported Access this long goes above and beyond for
a software company, IMO. Access is dead, though, and its time to move
onto better technologies.

If you want a single-file self-contained and free database engine for
single-users, give SQLite a try. There are many gui's for it as well as
conversion tools to migrate existing databases from Access and other
sources. You'll find COM-based wrappers, OleDb providers, ADO.NET
providers and many other bridges on their website as well:

http://www.sqlite.org

Robert
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Thanks. I looked at the link.

Looks nice.

Reminds me of a 'Normal' database which was a concept from 25 years ago.

Nice, ordered thinking but simply not practical.

Still, it did give a philosophical target level to be reached.

Thanks

Garry


Theo Verweij said:
ACID: http://databases.about.com/od/specificproducts/a/acid.htm
Thanks.

Well, I iz more that 15 years old too an I iz still going strong.

Two Giga iz plenty big enough for my desktop application, even in
extremis.

I dont know what ACID is.

I have looked thru the book at
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...E8-175B-46EA-86A0-C9DACAA84C85&displaylang=en
which is based on the "Anywhere" SQL database and I will give it a try.

I'll look at SQL light as well because Microsoft solutions tend to be on
the heavy side while claiming to be on the light side.

Thanks for the advice and answers

Garry


Robert Simpson said:
First - thank you for answering my post

[snip]

Why is Microsoft not fully supporting MS Access - a mature and well
tried data base which is excellent for stand-alone applications as mine
is.
Because:

1. Access db's have a 2gb size limit
2. Access is not ACID compliant
3. The Access database engine is 15 years old.

The fact that MS has supported Access this long goes above and beyond
for a software company, IMO. Access is dead, though, and its time to
move onto better technologies.

If you want a single-file self-contained and free database engine for
single-users, give SQLite a try. There are many gui's for it as well as
conversion tools to migrate existing databases from Access and other
sources. You'll find COM-based wrappers, OleDb providers, ADO.NET
providers and many other bridges on their website as well:

http://www.sqlite.org

Robert
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
See >>>

--
____________________________________
William (Bill) Vaughn
Author, Mentor, Consultant
Microsoft MVP
INETA Speaker
www.betav.com/blog/billva
www.betav.com
Please reply only to the newsgroup so that others can benefit.
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
__________________________________
Visit www.hitchhikerguides.net to get more information on my latest book:
Hitchhiker's Guide to Visual Studio and SQL Server (7th Edition)
Between now and Nov. 6th 2006 you can sign up for a substantial discount.
Look for the "Early Bird" discount checkbox on the registration form...
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Garry said:
First - thank you for answering my post

I, as a new .NET programmer, am rather sceptical about anything new from
Microsoft and its claims are often forgotten after a relatively short
period of time. Remember the Microsoft promise to make a fully compatible
Dot NET framework available for other operating systems, Linux for
instance or Mac computers making the DotNET languages fully cross
platform.
Click to expand...
I have yet to see one of these announced.

That SQL Server 2005 Compact Edition is free is good.

That it can be easily installed simply by copying DLLs to the target
machine is good. (Yet to be tested and seen)
Click to expand...
Duz it have a utility that will let me see the tables and their content or
must I write an appropriate generic utility for this.
Click to expand...
Is there a utility to define tables - as in MS Access.
Click to expand...
First editions from Microsoft are, sadly, usually half-baked and I need a
mature data base to re-write/base my very much data orientated
application.
Click to expand...
Why is Microsoft not fully supporting MS Access - a mature and well tried
data base which is excellent for stand-alone applications as mine is.
Click to expand...
 
¤ I would keep looking. TechEd Barcelona is supposed to be the launch vehicle
¤ for the Compact Edition.

They just release RC1 (and changed the product name).

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...CE-3FA1-453A-8CE9-AF6CA20946C3&displaylang=en


Paul
~~~~
Microsoft MVP (Visual Basic)
Click to expand...
Downloaded it last night, but unfortunately the documentation is very poor. No
examples except the ones for the previous version. After installing the RC1 I'm
still seeing SQL Server Mobile listed in the SQL Server Management Studio Create
Database menu.

I probably did something wrong :o(
Good luck with your project,

Otis Mukinfus
http://www.arltex.com
http://www.tomchilders.com
 
Oh dear,

Looks as in we are in the 'Half Baked' stage with no responsibility from
Microsoft on the product.

Use as is etc.

Still, I will try it even though I have been progressing with
SqlServerCe.SqlCeEngine

Garry
 
Cor, in American English, "quite a few" is synonymous with "many" or "a
lot". ;)

--
____________________________________
William (Bill) Vaughn
Author, Mentor, Consultant
Microsoft MVP
INETA Speaker
www.betav.com/blog/billva
www.betav.com
Please reply only to the newsgroup so that others can benefit.
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
__________________________________
Visit www.hitchhikerguides.net to get more information on my latest book:
Hitchhiker's Guide to Visual Studio and SQL Server (7th Edition)
Between now and Nov. 6th 2006 you can sign up for a substantial discount.
Look for the "Early Bird" discount checkbox on the registration form...
 
Ah, they wanted to get out a version sooner rather than later so yes, there
will still be a number of "name" disconnects until they get all of that
sorted out. They have to re-touch the SQL Server and VS tools as well as the
providers and DLLs to get all of these issues resolved. I address these
issues in my EBook (see www.hitchhikersguide.net).

--
____________________________________
William (Bill) Vaughn
Author, Mentor, Consultant
Microsoft MVP
INETA Speaker
www.betav.com/blog/billva
www.betav.com
Please reply only to the newsgroup so that others can benefit.
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
__________________________________
Visit www.hitchhikerguides.net to get more information on my latest book:
Hitchhiker's Guide to Visual Studio and SQL Server (7th Edition)
Between now and Nov. 6th 2006 you can sign up for a substantial discount.
Look for the "Early Bird" discount checkbox on the registration form...
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Bill,

Thanks I appreciate this message, it will prevent me for making this mistake
again.

:-)

Cor
 
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