Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver User's Guide - Introduction

Introducing the Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver

The Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver is an ODBC 3.51 driver for Microsoft Access. It lets ODBC-enabled applications access Microsoft Access databases from Linux and Unix platforms.

Chapter Guide

Overview

The Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver connects ODBC-enabled applications on Linux and Unix to Access databases. For example, connect to Access databases from Apache, ApplixWare, Informatica, OpenOffice.org and StarOffice. In addition, the Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver supports the Perl DBI and DBD::ODBC modules, PHP, PEAR DB, the Python pyodbc and mxODBC interfaces, C and any other ODBC-enabled programming language or interface.

Product Status

The Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver is currently available on Unix and Linux platforms. The most up to date list of Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver platforms is available at:

http://www.easysoft.com/products/data_access/odbc-access-driver/index.html

Software problems can be reported to support@easysoft.com by users who have either purchased support or registered at the Easysoft web site at http://www.easysoft.comand are evaluating Easysoft products.

Deployment

Access has four components: a structure to hold data (tables), a way to manipulate that data (the Microsoft Jet Database Engine engine), an environment to create a front end for the data (Design view of forms and reports) and tools that can run the front end (Data view of forms and reports). Access data is stored in a database file, which has the extension .mdb. The Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver communicates directly with the .mdb file. The Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver does not use Jet Database Engine to access the .mdb file. (However, the driver does use the Jet locking mechanisms to manage concurrent access to the .mdb file.)

If your Access database is split into two files, you can use the Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver to access your data by loading the backend (_be.mdb) file in which the tables are stored.

To access your Access data with the Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver:

¯ OR ¯

The Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver does not support Access Project files (.adb), which allow you to create an Access client front end to a SQL Server databases. If you need to access your SQL Server data from Linux or Unix, use the Easysoft ODBC-SQL Server Driver, which is available to download at:

http://www.easysoft.com/products/data_access/odbc-sql-server-driver/index.html

Supported Access Database Versions

The Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver supports version 4.0 .mdb files, which is the default format for databases created in Microsoft Access 2000, 2002 and 2003.

Although Microsoft Office Access 2007 introduced a new database file format, .accdb, version 4.0 .mdb files continue to be supported by later versions of Access.

The Easysoft ODBC-Access Driver also supports .accdb databases created in Microsoft Office Access 2007 and later.