More SQL Formatters

There are two more SQL Formatters besides one I mentioned before:

ApexSQL Refactor - addin for SQL Server 2005 management studio, you can format your SQL right in Query Analyzer.

SQLinForm - Java applet which formats all major databases SQL.

Learn Access from Crystal

Access video tutorials channel from Crystal, Access MVP  - LearnAccessByCrystal. Check it out, new tutorials are coming!

SQL Formatter

A nice tool SQL and PL/SQL Formatter (actually a web page) to format SQL language (Access, T-SQL, etc) to a number of useful formats – html, VBA, XML, whatever you can imagine. Here how html output looks like for T-SQL:

SELECT tblBill.BillID,
       --tblBill.BillNum,
       tblBill.BillDate
FROM   tblBill
WHERE  Datediff(d,tblBill.BillDate,Getdate()) > @intDays

Access 97 crash on Server 2003

If you would run Access 97 application on Server 2003 SP1 or SP2 – you probably experience a crash of Access while pressing a button, whatever. In order to make it running – you have to either switch off Data Execution Prevention (DEP), or add Access to exceptions list in DEP dialog.

KB960715 (IE7) is breaking Access apps

Graham Mandeno, Access MVP, have found, that latest security update for IE7 breaks Access applications using some of Microsoft ActiveX controls. Details below:

PROBLEM:

Access applications that incorporate certain VB6 ActiveX controls are failing on computers when the "critical security update" KB960715 is installed.

FURTHER INFORMATION:

The Security Advisory for KB960715

The update sets "kill bits" that disable certain third-party and Microsoft ActiveX controls, including the following:

Class Identifier	ActiveX Control
{1E216240-1B7D-11CF-9D53-00AA003C9CB6}	Microsoft Animation Control 5.0
{3A2B370C-BA0A-11d1-B137-0000F8753F5D}	Microsoft Chart Control 6.0
{B09DE715-87C1-11d1-8BE3-0000F8754DA1}	Microsoft Animation Control 6.0
{cde57a43-8b86-11d0-b3c6-00a0c90aea82}	Microsoft DataGrid Control 6.0
{6262d3a0-531b-11cf-91f6-c2863c385e30}	Microsoft FlexGrid Control 6.0
{0ECD9B64-23AA-11d0-B351-00A0C9055D8E}	Microsoft Hierarchical FlexGrid Control 6.0
{C932BA85-4374-101B-A56C-00AA003668DC}	Microsoft Masked Edit Control 6.0
{248dd896-bb45-11cf-9abc-0080c7e7b78d}	Microsoft WinSock Control 6.0

Any form that uses these controls will give errors such as "There is no object in this control".

Any attempt to delete the ActiveX control and rebuild the form gives the error "Microsoft Access does not support this ActiveX control".

WORKAROUND:

Another KB article, KB957924, is a cumulative update rollup for VB6.

It includes newer versions (6.1.98.12) of the above controls that do not have the security vulnerability.

Unfortunately, this update may only be installed if you have VB6 installed.

However, it is possible to install KB957924 on a machine with VB6 and then deploy copies of the new OCX files to the affected end-user machines.

This workaround is unwieldy, as it requires an administrator to install and register the updated OCX files on every end-user machine.

SUGGESTION:

Microsoft should add the "safe" versions of the affected OCX files to the KB960715 update, so that instead of killing the old versions of those controls, the new, safe versions are installed and registered.

Furthermore, Microsoft should create another download which includes the "safe" versions of these OCX files so that machines that have been adversely affected by KB960715 can easily be updated without the need to have VB6 installed.

And some comments from other Access MVP, Sascha Trowitzsch:

BTW: I am using two tools to activate/deactivate ActiveX controls:

http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/axhelper.html

http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/acm.html

SQL-DMO and SQL Server 2008

If you have moved to Microsoft SQL Server 2008 and missed SQL Distributed Management Objects (SQL-DMO or SQLDMO) library - do not panic, you can download it as a part of Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Feature Pack. Actually you get Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Backward Compatibility Components, but it still works with 2008 server.

More on search in Access

One more tool, besides ones I mentioned earlier – V-Tools. Furthermore it has extra useful tools for Access developers:

• Personal Object Library
• Internal Pictures
• Work on Queries
• Import/export Specifications
• System Colors
• Form Templates
• Container Objects Explorer