Importing Data into MS Access with ODBC - Configuring an ODBC Source

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In order to connect to a database we need to have what is called an ODBC datasource. This is created using the 32bit ODBC Manager installed when Office 2000 is installed, or gets installed with the operating system. In Window XP Professional, you can get to the ODBC Administrator by going through Start ->Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> ODBC Sources Short-Cut ->ODBC Data Sources Administrator. Now click on ODBC Data Sources (the previous screen shot) to open the picture shown next.

This is a part of the ODBC Data Sources Administrator macro. There are two tabs, File Data Source and Machine data Source. By default, it opens up the File Data Source tab in the clicked position. By choosing the Machine Data Source tab all the users of this machine and the system can use the data source. There are a number of data sources already created and these are shown in window.

User Data Source and ODBC Drivers

Now click on New... to open the next window, where you choose whether only you can access, or all the users of the machine can access this resource. Here, the User Data Source choice is made. Click Next.

This opens up the next window, where you make a choice as to the driver you may want to use. As you can see here, there are a large number of drivers for diverse kinds of data sources, such MS Access, MS Excel, FoxPro, Oracle, and so on. This window is important as you can see the version and dates for the various drivers. We further assume that we will link to a file on an MSDE (Microsoft SQL Desktop Edition) database on the machine. After choosing SQL Server we click next.

You will be shown a short summary screen indicating the type of datasource you created: (User data Source) and the driver you have chosen (SQL Server). Click Finish to this screen. This opens up the next window where you need to configure certain features of the MSDE database.

Next: Configuring the New Data Source to MSDE >>
 

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