Frequently Asked Questions About The Access Workbench

Frequently Asked Questions About The Access Workbench

This page has a list of frequently asked questions that users have posed for the Access Workbench.

1) How can you put the Workbench on a computer without running the installation setup program? I need to do this at clients that has set me up as a user rather than as an Administration account?

Generally the Access Workbench will work fine even if you don't run the Setup program that comes with the full download. When monitoring and administering users at client sites, we generally run the Workbench.exe from the My Documents folder of the account that we are given. You can download the latest version of the workbench without the setup program on the following line. Installation instructions included in the file

Download simple installation here

2) Will The Workbench work in Windows Vista, Windows 7 or Windows 7 64 Bit

Yes but you need to read this page first as Vista makes things like switching Access versions more difficult

3) How can I use the Access by-pass key with The Workbench

When you click on on the Open button, all you have to do is hold the shift key down. If Access then prompts you for a user name and password, you will need to hold the shift key down after this workgroup prompt. Generally though, you would setup workgroup accounts within The Workbench to save you the trouble of entering usernames and passwords.

4) Does the Workbench work with front-end databases on local hard drives?

When working with local hard drive setups for performance or exclusive data reasons, you need to use the Access workbench a little differently. Firstly you will probably only want to monitor the back-end database so set your workbench favorites to point to the backend. The biggest change is that you you will need to modify is the special code that works with the Administration button (messages and shutdown code). This code now needs to look for a file on the server every five minutes or so. Read more

5) How can I close the workbench when it has finished compacting?

In the version 4.1, you can choose the File menu ~ Auto-Exit and the Workbench will be enabled to close when all your backup, decompiling, compacting and compiling requests for the current database are complete. You can also click on the Exit label to achieve the same thing.

6) Can I schedule the Workbench to run over night?

In the version 4.1, you can start the Workbench using command line options. As the Windows Task Scheduler works using the same commands, you can use this to run the workbench at scheduled times during the week. Read more This can be supplemented by using code in your database that shutdowns the database at standard times during the day so that no one is on it when the scheduler kicks in. Read More about Access code

7) Why is the backup checkbox selected when I click on a database favorite that I haven't used for a long time?

In the favorites, you can define an minimum interval (in days) between which backups of the database will occur. If the last backup and the current favorite files are the same size, the backup will not take place. File sizes will only only be the same if the current favorite has also been compacted. Read more about Favorites

8) Why doesn't the workbench compact the database straight after it is backed up?

The Workbench decides to compact and backup databases as soon as the Who's On button is pressed and the Workbench discovers that no one is using the database. If you do not press/click the Who's on button, the Workbench will refresh the users list itself according to the Number of Minutes between Refreshing the List setting in the Options form.

9) We purchased the workbench at the request of one of our developers.
He thought he had the ability to close open databases, or kick the users off of it, but I don’t see that ability. Am I missing something here?

It is in the Workbench, you need to add a bit of code and a form to each database.

You may have the Admin button turned off, it can be turned on in the Options form by pressing the options button. See figure 2 on this page.

10) I lost my drive but have the Workbench.reg file, what do I do?

You double click the .REG file and the settings will be added to your registry. The only setting not added will be the Registration details which you need to get from the email we send you when you purchase the software

11) One of the folks who needs to approve of my purchase of Access Workbench needs to be assured that Workbench's ability to send messages to database users, prevent new connections to the database, and to shut down a database will not slow down our network. ?

There are two systems at play here. In the Workbench exe, there is an ADO command that retrieves the list of users of a database. This is setup to run every 2 minutes but that period can be increased or turned off in the Workbench options. This is probably a tiny bit intensive.

In the shutdown and messaging, the code is in the database and simply looks for the presence of either the messaging file or the shutdown file. You can vary how often this runs but it really is little more than a request to see if a file exists.

Given that both of these systems will allow you to compact more or shut people out a database and reduce file locks, any minor network traffic of the two workbench systems is worth the minor network resources.

12) We have lots of databases, do we have to work through these manually inside the Workbench to undertake compacting and repairing?

A way to get around this is to use the Building Shortcuts feature to setup all the shortcuts to the databases that you want to manage. Then you will be able to open all the databases in different Workbench sessions and have each session close when the action(s) are completed. The Workbench has a close on complete option.