Multiuser BE on peer-to-peer

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David Howlett - 31 Mar 2005 00:58 GMT

We have an Access 2000 application that has been working in a single user
environment. We now need to expand three more users. The current environment
is a peer-to-peer network. Three seperate computers connected by a hub.

The application involves appointment scheduling and light editing of
personal records. Two users will be doing the scheduling and two will be
editing personal records. There are several reports which run that require
the entire database but I can schedule those during off hours to keep the
network and record locking traffic down to a trickle.

I am interested if anyone has had real world experience with 4 or more users
in a peer-to-peer environment. Once again, there is no server here. I
appreciate any feedback.

Thanks!

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Larry Linson - 31 Mar 2005 06:43 GMT

> We have an Access 2000 application
> that has been working in a single user
> environment. We now need to expand
> three more users. The current environment
> is a peer-to-peer network. Three seperate
> computers connected by a hub.

There are limitations in the OS as to how many concurrent connnections you
can have in a peer-to-peer environment. If I recall correctly, that was
introduced along with Windows 2000, and, AFAIK, Windows 98 did not have that
limitation.

There's an introductory presentation on Access in a Multiuser Environment
that I did for my user group that you can download from
http://appdevissues.tripod.com. It will identify topics that I thought
worthwhile to discuss, and a bit more. The best collection of detailed
information and links on the subject of Access in the multiuser environment
is at MVP Tony Toews' site, http://www.granite.ab.ca/accsmstr.htm.

Larry Linson
Microsoft Access MVP

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Brendan Reynolds - 31 Mar 2005 09:48 GMT

For a small group like this, the major disadvantage of this approach is that
the PC which is functioning as the file server is also being used as a
workstation. Inevitably, there will be times when, for whatever reason,
possibly completely unconnected with the Access application, that PC
crashes, or the users shuts down or reboots without remembering to ensure
that everyone else disconnects from the database first. This can cause
corruption of the database.

PCs are quite cheap these days. I would recommend adding another PC to be
used as the file server and only as the file server. For a small group like
this, it doesn't have to be a very expensive PC, and it doesn't have to be
running a server operating system - it just needs to be left alone to get on
with the job of serving data (and backing it up at night) without being
interrupted by other tasks.

Signature

Brendan Reynolds (MVP)

> We have an Access 2000 application that has been working in a single user
> environment. We now need to expand three more users. The current
[quoted text clipped - 14 lines]
>
> Thanks!

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Tony Toews - 04 Apr 2005 18:53 GMT

>I am interested if anyone has had real world experience with 4 or more users
>in a peer-to-peer environment. Once again, there is no server here. I
>appreciate any feedback.

Note that you may run into a limit on the number of network
connections to a non server version of Windows.

Tony
--
Tony Toews, Microsoft Access MVP
Please respond only in the newsgroups so that others can
read the entire thread of messages.
Microsoft Access Links, Hints, Tips & Accounting Systems at
http://www.granite.ab.ca/accsmstr.htm

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Klatuu - 06 Apr 2005 18:55 GMT

Brenda's suggestion is the best solution. Also, be sure you split the
database, and put the back end mdb on the machine to use as a server and a
copy of the front end on every user's computer.

> We have an Access 2000 application that has been working in a single user
> environment. We now need to expand three more users. The current environment
[quoted text clipped - 11 lines]
>
> Thanks!

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