Understanding and Creating an Access Project - Linking to specific tables
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The next step after the above is to follow faithfully the Linked Table Wizard. If you have used MS Access before, this should be a familiar interface. On the left you see a list of Available Tables:, and you may choose as many as you want and click on the >. This will be transferred to the right, to Link to Project:. You may also choose all the tables by clicking on >>.
In the present case, three tables and a view are chosen to be linked as shown.
If you click Next to the above screen, you will see the following screen. Now the wizard has everything to link your Access Project to the SQL Server tables by creating views on the SQL Server for the tables you have chosen.
By clicking Finish, you are back in the Access Project. Now you have all the tables and the view you have chosen in the form of Queries.
Voila! the data is linked.
Double click the localhost_Northwind.dbo.Orders table to see the contents of this table as shown in the next picture. You can now work with these linked objects to create queries, reports, and so forth.
Here is a report generated using the Report wizard in the Access Project using the data in the imported View.
Now open up your SQL Server's Enterprise Manager and click on the databases node, followed by opening the ProjAccSQL database. You will see the following views in the Views node of this server as shown in this picture.
Summary
The tutorial provides a detailed introduction to creating a Microsoft Access Project starting from scratch. This is very useful for backend databases on MSDE which do not have a UI. MSDE is free for users having license for the Office suite (check for the version you need to have). The 2GB size of MSDE is large enough for smaller applications. The migration path from Access to SQL Server via this transition is worth considering, however remember that the SQL Server stores all queries as views or stored procedures. You may have to exercise restraint in creating queries as they may end up bloating the database. Also, the shift from DAO to ADO may make the developers learn to adapt to new language constructs. These will be considered in future tutorials.
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