One of our company client was having a powerlink software which is a car junk yard management software. It was running on SQL Server. The client wanted to have some extra reports. They already had one developer who built some reports and then left. Now I had to finish the remaining job. I got SQL Server database as well as half done Access project. Now the problem started.
What that developer did was he used linked tables from the Access to SQL Server. The connection string for all those tables were created by MS Access. When I ported the project on my computer, it crashed because it was not finding that linked table. There were A LOT of tables. MS Access provides “Linked Table Manager” but it sucks. It updates link of only one table at a time. This application would eat up my lot of time to change the link. Also, If I would be moving database or the application somewhere else, I would again spend the same amount of time to change the links of tables. I tried to find out any ready made tool for changing these links. I found this article which was showing how to make an application which updates the links of linked table.
Problem with this application was
- Every time when application starts, it checks whether the links of table are perfect or not
- We have to hard code the database name in which linked tables reside
- I cannot use my own connection string to connect to a particular database.
So inspired by the above mentioned article, I made a custom application which solves these problems. This application requires as input the database in which linked tables reside and the connection string of your choice.
After pressing “Next” You will see a list of all tables. Click on table names for which you want to (more technically, say)refresh the link. After completing the task, it will give feedback.
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