Send Access Data Base to Friends without Access

[Bob]

I have a small Access data base of contact information for a group of 37
friends from high school. As we find more people, I would like to send out
the updated data base to our group. Most do not have Access.

Is there a way for me to bundle it or package it so that they can view the
data base (and the forms/reports I created) without having Access? I can
export it to Excel, but the results are not very pretty.

Thanks!

 

[Douglas J. Steele]

You can have them install the Snapshot Viewer from
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...3f-6d74-423d-8274-8b7e6313edfb&DisplayLang=en
and then export the reports as Snapshots, or you can get ReportToPDF from
Stephen Lebans at http://www.lebans.com/reporttopdf.htm and save the reports
as PDF files.

Any ODBC-compliant application (such as Excel or Word) is capable of reading
the data in a Jet database. However, there's no way to use Access forms and
reports without having Access installed. There is an Access Developer
Edition that lets you package your application along with a royalty-free
run-time version of Access. Users without Access can install the run-time
and use the application (although they will not be able to make design
changes to it). However, prior to Access 2007, this was a relatively
expensive option. Check what Tony Toews has at
http://www.granite.ab.ca/access/developereditionfaq.htm for more details
about the Developer Edition.