Multiuser Database Solutions
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Microsoft Office provides a broad array of tools and technologies for creating multiuser database solutions. Specifically, Microsoft Access provides tools and features for creating multiuser database solutions by using four different database architectures: file-server, client/server, replication, and Web-based data access pages. This chapter deals with the first three types; Web-based solutions (including data access pages) are addressed in Chapter 5, "Working with Office Applications" and Chapter 12, "Using Web Technologies."
Although Access is the primary focus of multiuser database features, other Office applications also provide data access and reporting features, such as Excel's Microsoft Query tool, PivotTable reports, and PivotChart reports, all of which can be connected to a variety of database back-ends, including an Access database, a SQL Server database, or an online analytical processing (OLAP) server, such as the Microsoft SQL Server OLAP Services. Additionally, you can create Web-based multiuser solutions using the Office Web components available when you publish pages from Excel or FrontPage. All Office applications that support Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) programming also provide access to data when you use ActiveX Data Objects (ADO) and Data Access Objects (DAO) from VBA code.
Note The discussions about code and code examples used throughout this section refer to ADO unless noted otherwise. Features that require DAO are noted as exceptions. DAO code written for multiuser database solutions in previous versions of Access should continue to work in most cases, as long as your project contains a reference to the Microsoft DAO 3.6 object library. For detailed information about using DAO code, see DAO 3.6 Help and the Microsoft Jet Database Engine Programmer's Guide, Second Edition (Microsoft Press, 1997).
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Multiuser Database Solution Architectures