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  1. #1
    sgtdetritus's Avatar
    sgtdetritus is offline Novice
    Windows 7 64bit Access 2010 32bit
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    Access 97 DB that is locked down and the author was laid off years ago.

    Hello All,



    I've got something of a sticky problem here and am at a loss how to fix it. I'm trying to help a co-worker in another group with something. He has an Access 97 DB that was developed years ago by someone who was laid off years ago. It badly needs some cleanup and some updates to something more modern. The original author left my friend with admin capability, but he's not really good with DB programming. The most recent problem has been that he can no longer add users. He was able to do so before, but the last few people he has tried to add are not appearing in the users list.

    This has kind of become the last straw. He has used some of the other tools that I have created (split db with access 2010. Users just get a front end .accdr file) and he would like to get things moving in that direction. The primary problem is that the user level security features have made it impossible to migrate the DB from access 97 to anything more recent. We cannot find any sort of .mdw file. We can't seem to be able to take out the security either. We have tried creating a blank db and importing everything into 2003 but we end up with a bug filled mess. Most of the tables come over. maybe half of the queries import. almost none of the forms came across clean. The queries that do give me issues that make me think there is a problem with relationships being screwed up.

    So is there something that we can do to get things at least moving in the right direction without having to re-engineer everything from scratch? The tools I have available are Access 97, access 2003 (which cannot open the DB because of permissions errors), and Access 2014. Our IT department is outsourced, in another country, and absolutely clueless when it comes to issues that are not listed in their call script. Our machines may or may not be able to download outside tools, and we aren't supposed to use anything not explicitly approved by IT.

    I suspect the first key is going to be disabling the security measures. After that we should be able to keep people able to work in the db while we set up some sort of migration path that does not require re-writing a ton of queries, forms, and reports.

  2. #2
    ssanfu is offline Master of Nothing
    Windows 7 32bit Access 2010 32bit
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    Anchorage, Alaska, USA
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    9,664
    While I have A97 and have used it a lot (years and years ago), I think your best bet would be sending Colin (isladogs) a PM (on this forum) and/or go to his web site http://www.mendipdatasystems.co.uk/
    Look in the center bottom of the main page for "Database Conversion".
    You can also email him......

  3. #3
    isladogs's Avatar
    isladogs is offline MVP / VIP
    Windows 10 Access 2010 32bit
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    Jan 2014
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    5,954
    As ssanfu stated I may be able to help though it could be difficult without the mdw file if that is required.
    Get in touch if you wish to discuss further.
    Are you able to prove ownership of the file if necessary?

    http://www.mendipdatasystems.co.uk/d...ion/4594459112
    Colin, Access MVP, Website, email
    The more I learn, the more I know I don't know. When I don't know, I keep quiet!
    If I don't know that I don't know, I don't know whether to answer

  4. #4
    sgtdetritus's Avatar
    sgtdetritus is offline Novice
    Windows 7 64bit Access 2010 32bit
    Join Date
    Sep 2018
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    19
    Thanks everyone. This little project has been tabled in favor of other more pressing matters.
    I've figured out a very tedious way to migrate most of the mess. To be honest it is such a mass of spaghetti it would be better just to copy the tables and rebuild the rest from scratch. It has tons of abandoned queries and unused forms. While using the conversion service would be nice, the IT overlords here are more than a little uptight especially since it contains both Customer and FAA data, they simply won't allow it. The description of the process in broad strokes gives me some ideas on how to proceed in a slow and steady way to get it done. At that time I can spend a little effort on cleaning out the weird dross. Not fun, but not impossible.
    Thanks again to ssanfu and isladogs for their help!

  5. #5
    ssanfu is offline Master of Nothing
    Windows 7 32bit Access 2010 32bit
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    We're happy to help..

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