How do you use version control with Access develop

Question

I'm involved with updating an Access solution. It has a good amount of VBA, a number of queries, a small amount of tables, and a few forms for data entry & report generation. It's an ideal candidate for Access.

I want to make changes to the table design, the VBA, the queries, and the forms. How can I track my changes with version control? (we use Subversion, but this goes for any flavor) I can stick the entire mdb in subversion, but that will be storing a binary file, and I won't be able to tell that I just changed one line of VBA code.

I thought about copying the VBA code to separate files, and saving those, but I could see those quickly getting out of sync with what's in the database.

Answer 1

The compose/decompose solution posted by Oliver is great, but it has some problems:

• The files are encoded as UCS-2 (UTF-16) which can cause version control systems/tools to consider the files to be binary.
• The files contain a lot of cruft that changes often - checksums, printer information and more. This is a serious problem if you want clean diffs or need to cooperate on the project.

I was planning to fix this myself, but discovered there is already a good solution available: timabell/msaccess-vcs-integration on GitHub. I have tested msaccess-vcs-integration and it does work great.

Updated 3rd of March 2015: The project was originally maintained/owned by bkidwell on Github, but it was transferred to timabell - link above to project is updated accordingly. There are some forks from the original project by bkidwell, for example by ArminBra and by matonb, which AFAICT shouldn't be used.

The downside to using msaccess-vcs-integration compared to Olivers's decompose solution:

• It's significantly slower. I'm sure that the speed issue can be fixed, but I don't need to export my project to text that often ...
• It doesn't create a stub Access project with the exported stuff removed. This can also be fixed (by adopting code from the decompose script), but again - not that important.

Anyway, my clear recommendation is msaccess-vcs-integration. It solved all the problems I had with using Git on the exported files.

Answer 2

There's a gotcha - VSS 6.0 can only accept MDB's using the add-in under a certain number of objects, which includes all local tables, queries, modules, and forms. Don't know the exact object limit.

To build our 10 year old prod floor app, which is huge, we are forced to combine 3 or 4 separate MDBs out of SS into one MDB , which complicates automated builds to the point we don't waste time doing it.

I think I'll try the script above to spew this MDb into SVN and simplify builds for everyone.

Answer 3

For completeness...

There's always "Visual Studio [YEAR] Tools for the Microsoft Office System" (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vs2005/aa718673.aspx) but that seems to require VSS. To me VSS (auto corrupting) is worse than my 347 save points on my uber backuped network share.

Answer 4

This entry describes a totally different approach from the other entries, and may not be what you're looking for. So I won't be offended if you ignore this. But at least it is food for thought.

In some professional commercial software development environments, configuration management (CM) of software deliverables is not normally done within the software application itself or software project itself. CM is imposed upon the final deliverable products, by saving the software in a special CM folder, where both the file and its folder are marked with version identification. For example, Clearcase allows the data manager to "check in" a software file, assign it a "branch", assign it a "bubble", and apply "labels". When you want to see and download a file, you have to configure your "config spec" to point to the version you want, then cd into the folder and there it is.

Just an idea.

Answer 5

You can also connect your MS Access to the Team Foundation Server. There is also a free Express variant for up to 5 developers. Works really well!

• English guide
• Team Foundation Server 2012 Express

Edit: fixed link

Answer 6

For anyone stuck with Access 97, I was not able to get the other answers to work. Using a combination of Oliver's and DaveParillo's excellent answers and making some modifications, I was able to get the scripts working with our Access 97 databases. It's also a bit more user-friendly since it asks which folder to place the files.

AccessExport.vbs:

' Converts all modules, classes, forms and macros from an Access file (.mdb) <input file> to
' text and saves the results in separate files to <path>.  Requires Microsoft Access.
Option Explicit

Const acQuery = 1
Const acForm = 2
Const acModule = 5
Const acMacro = 4
Const acReport = 3
Const acCmdCompactDatabase = 4
Const TemporaryFolder = 2

Dim strMDBFileName : strMDBFileName = SelectDatabaseFile
Dim strExportPath : strExportPath = SelectExportFolder
CreateExportFolders(strExportPath)
Dim objProgressWindow
Dim strOverallProgress
CreateProgressWindow objProgressWindow
Dim strTempMDBFileName
CopyToTempDatabase strMDBFileName, strTempMDBFileName, strOverallProgress
Dim objAccess
Dim objDatabase
OpenAccessDatabase objAccess, objDatabase, strTempMDBFileName, strOverallProgress
ExportQueries objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strExportPath, strOverallProgress
ExportForms objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strExportPath, strOverallProgress
ExportReports objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strExportPath, strOverallProgress
ExportMacros objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strExportPath, strOverallProgress
ExportModules objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strExportPath, strOverallProgress
objAccess.CloseCurrentDatabase
objAccess.Quit
DeleteTempDatabase strTempMDBFileName, strOverallProgress
objProgressWindow.Quit
MsgBox "Successfully exported database."

Private Function SelectDatabaseFile()
    MsgBox "Please select the Access database to export."
    Dim objFileOpen : Set objFileOpen = CreateObject("SAFRCFileDlg.FileOpen")
    If objFileOpen.OpenFileOpenDlg Then
        SelectDatabaseFile = objFileOpen.FileName
    Else
        WScript.Quit()
    End If
End Function

Private Function SelectExportFolder()
    Dim objShell : Set objShell = CreateObject("Shell.Application")
    SelectExportFolder = objShell.BrowseForFolder(0, "Select folder to export the database to:", 0, "").self.path & "\"
End Function

Private Sub CreateExportFolders(strExportPath)
    Dim objFileSystem : Set objFileSystem = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    MsgBox "Existing folders from a previous Access export under " & strExportPath & " will be deleted!"
    If objFileSystem.FolderExists(strExportPath & "Queries\") Then
        objFileSystem.DeleteFolder strExportPath & "Queries", true
    End If
    objFileSystem.CreateFolder(strExportPath & "Queries\")
    If objFileSystem.FolderExists(strExportPath & "Forms\") Then
        objFileSystem.DeleteFolder strExportPath & "Forms", true
    End If
    objFileSystem.CreateFolder(strExportPath & "Forms\")
    If objFileSystem.FolderExists(strExportPath & "Reports\") Then
        objFileSystem.DeleteFolder strExportPath & "Reports", true
    End If
    objFileSystem.CreateFolder(strExportPath & "Reports\")
    If objFileSystem.FolderExists(strExportPath & "Macros\") Then
        objFileSystem.DeleteFolder strExportPath & "Macros", true
    End If
    objFileSystem.CreateFolder(strExportPath & "Macros\")
    If objFileSystem.FolderExists(strExportPath & "Modules\") Then
        objFileSystem.DeleteFolder strExportPath & "Modules", true
    End If
    objFileSystem.CreateFolder(strExportPath & "Modules\")
End Sub

Private Sub CreateProgressWindow(objProgressWindow)
    Set objProgressWindow = CreateObject ("InternetExplorer.Application")
    objProgressWindow.Navigate "about:blank"
    objProgressWindow.ToolBar = 0
    objProgressWindow.StatusBar = 0
    objProgressWindow.Width = 320
    objProgressWindow.Height = 240
    objProgressWindow.Visible = 1
    objProgressWindow.Document.Title = "Access export in progress"
End Sub

Private Sub CopyToTempDatabase(strMDBFileName, strTempMDBFileName, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Copying to temporary database...<br/>"
    Dim objFileSystem : Set objFileSystem = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    strTempMDBFileName = objFileSystem.GetSpecialFolder(TemporaryFolder) & "\" & objFileSystem.GetBaseName(strMDBFileName) & "_temp.mdb"
    objFileSystem.CopyFile strMDBFileName, strTempMDBFileName
End Sub

Private Sub OpenAccessDatabase(objAccess, objDatabase, strTempMDBFileName, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Compacting temporary database...<br/>"
    Set objAccess = CreateObject("Access.Application")
    objAccess.Visible = false
    CompactAccessDatabase objAccess, strTempMDBFileName
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Opening temporary database...<br/>"
    objAccess.OpenCurrentDatabase strTempMDBFileName
    Set objDatabase = objAccess.CurrentDb
End Sub

' Sometimes the Compact Database command errors out, and it's not serious if the database isn't compacted first.
Private Sub CompactAccessDatabase(objAccess, strTempMDBFileName)
    On Error Resume Next
    Dim objFileSystem : Set objFileSystem = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    objAccess.DbEngine.CompactDatabase strTempMDBFileName, strTempMDBFileName & "_"
    objFileSystem.CopyFile strTempMDBFileName & "_", strTempMDBFileName
    objFileSystem.DeleteFile strTempMDBFileName & "_"
End Sub

Private Sub ExportQueries(objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strExportPath, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Exporting Queries (Step 1 of 5)...<br/>"
    Dim counter
    For counter = 0 To objDatabase.QueryDefs.Count - 1
        objProgressWindow.Document.Body.InnerHTML = strOverallProgress & counter + 1 & " of " & objDatabase.QueryDefs.Count
        objAccess.SaveAsText acQuery, objDatabase.QueryDefs(counter).Name, strExportPath & "Queries\" & Clean(objDatabase.QueryDefs(counter).Name) & ".sql"
    Next
End Sub

Private Sub ExportForms(objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strExportPath, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Exporting Forms (Step 2 of 5)...<br/>"
    Dim counter : counter = 1
    Dim objContainer : Set objContainer = objDatabase.Containers("Forms")
    Dim objDocument
    For Each objDocument In objContainer.Documents
        objProgressWindow.Document.Body.InnerHTML = strOverallProgress & counter & " of " & objContainer.Documents.Count
        counter = counter + 1
        objAccess.SaveAsText acForm, objDocument.Name, strExportPath & "Forms\" & Clean(objDocument.Name) & ".form"
        objAccess.DoCmd.Close acForm, objDocument.Name
    Next
End Sub

Private Sub ExportReports(objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strExportPath, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Exporting Reports (Step 3 of 5)...<br/>"
    Dim counter : counter = 1
    Dim objContainer : Set objContainer = objDatabase.Containers("Reports")
    Dim objDocument
    For Each objDocument In objContainer.Documents
        objProgressWindow.Document.Body.InnerHTML = strOverallProgress & counter & " of " & objContainer.Documents.Count
        counter = counter + 1
        objAccess.SaveAsText acReport, objDocument.Name, strExportPath & "Reports\" & Clean(objDocument.Name) & ".report"
    Next
End Sub

Private Sub ExportMacros(objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strExportPath, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Exporting Macros (Step 4 of 5)...<br/>"
    Dim counter : counter = 1
    Dim objContainer : Set objContainer = objDatabase.Containers("Scripts")
    Dim objDocument
    For Each objDocument In objContainer.Documents
        objProgressWindow.Document.Body.InnerHTML = strOverallProgress & counter & " of " & objContainer.Documents.Count
        counter = counter + 1
        objAccess.SaveAsText acMacro, objDocument.Name, strExportPath & "Macros\" & Clean(objDocument.Name) & ".macro"
    Next
End Sub

Private Sub ExportModules(objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strExportPath, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Exporting Modules (Step 5 of 5)...<br/>"
    Dim counter : counter = 1
    Dim objContainer : Set objContainer = objDatabase.Containers("Modules")
    Dim objDocument
    For Each objDocument In objContainer.Documents
        objProgressWindow.Document.Body.InnerHTML = strOverallProgress & counter & " of " & objContainer.Documents.Count
        counter = counter + 1
        objAccess.SaveAsText acModule, objDocument.Name, strExportPath & "Modules\" & Clean(objDocument.Name) & ".module"
    Next
End Sub

Private Sub DeleteTempDatabase(strTempMDBFileName, strOverallProgress)
    On Error Resume Next
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Deleting temporary database...<br/>"
    Dim objFileSystem : Set objFileSystem = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    objFileSystem.DeleteFile strTempMDBFileName, true
End Sub

' Windows doesn't like certain characters, so we have to filter those out of the name when exporting
Private Function Clean(strInput)
    Dim objRegexp : Set objRegexp = New RegExp
    objRegexp.IgnoreCase = True
    objRegexp.Global = True
    objRegexp.Pattern = "[\\/:*?""<>|]"
    Dim strOutput
    If objRegexp.Test(strInput) Then
        strOutput = objRegexp.Replace(strInput, "")
        MsgBox strInput & " is being exported as " & strOutput
    Else
        strOutput = strInput
    End If
    Clean = strOutput
End Function

And for importing files into the database, should you need to recreate the database from scratch or you wish to modify files outside of Access for some reason.

AccessImport.vbs:

' Imports all of the queries, forms, reports, macros, and modules from text
' files to an Access file (.mdb).  Requires Microsoft Access.
Option Explicit

const acQuery = 1
const acForm = 2
const acModule = 5
const acMacro = 4
const acReport = 3
const acCmdCompileAndSaveAllModules = &H7E

Dim strMDBFilename : strMDBFilename = SelectDatabaseFile
CreateBackup strMDBFilename
Dim strImportPath : strImportPath = SelectImportFolder
Dim objAccess
Dim objDatabase
OpenAccessDatabase objAccess, objDatabase, strMDBFilename
Dim objProgressWindow
Dim strOverallProgress
CreateProgressWindow objProgressWindow
ImportQueries objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strImportPath, strOverallProgress
ImportForms objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strImportPath, strOverallProgress
ImportReports objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strImportPath, strOverallProgress
ImportMacros objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strImportPath, strOverallProgress
ImportModules objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strImportPath, strOverallProgress
objAccess.CloseCurrentDatabase
objAccess.Quit
objProgressWindow.Quit
MsgBox "Successfully imported objects into the database."

Private Function SelectDatabaseFile()
    MsgBox "Please select the Access database to import the objects from.  ALL EXISTING OBJECTS WITH THE SAME NAME WILL BE OVERWRITTEN!"
    Dim objFileOpen : Set objFileOpen = CreateObject( "SAFRCFileDlg.FileOpen" )
    If objFileOpen.OpenFileOpenDlg Then
        SelectDatabaseFile = objFileOpen.FileName
    Else
        WScript.Quit()
    End If
End Function

Private Function SelectImportFolder()
    Dim objShell : Set objShell = WScript.CreateObject("Shell.Application")
    SelectImportFolder = objShell.BrowseForFolder(0, "Select folder to import the database objects from:", 0, "").self.path & "\"
End Function

Private Sub CreateBackup(strMDBFilename)
    Dim objFileSystem : Set objFileSystem = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    objFileSystem.CopyFile strMDBFilename, strMDBFilename & ".bak"
End Sub

Private Sub OpenAccessDatabase(objAccess, objDatabase, strMDBFileName)
    Set objAccess = CreateObject("Access.Application")
    objAccess.OpenCurrentDatabase strMDBFilename
    objAccess.Visible = false
    Set objDatabase = objAccess.CurrentDb
End Sub

Private Sub CreateProgressWindow(ByRef objProgressWindow)
    Set objProgressWindow = CreateObject ("InternetExplorer.Application")
    objProgressWindow.Navigate "about:blank"
    objProgressWindow.ToolBar = 0
    objProgressWindow.StatusBar = 0
    objProgressWindow.Width = 320
    objProgressWindow.Height = 240
    objProgressWindow.Visible = 1
    objProgressWindow.Document.Title = "Access import in progress"
End Sub

Private Sub ImportQueries(objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strImportPath, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = "Importing Queries (Step 1 of 5)...<br/>"
    Dim counter : counter = 0
    Dim folder : Set folder = objFileSystem.GetFolder(strImportPath & "Queries\")
    Dim objFileSystem : Set objFileSystem = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    Dim file
    Dim strQueryName
    For Each file in folder.Files
        objProgressWindow.Document.Body.InnerHTML = strOverallProgress & counter + 1 & " of " & folder.Files.Count
        strQueryName = objFileSystem.GetBaseName(file.Name)
        objAccess.LoadFromText acQuery, strQueryName, file.Path
        counter = counter + 1
    Next
End Sub

Private Sub ImportForms(objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strImportPath, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Importing Forms (Step 2 of 5)...<br/>"
    Dim counter : counter = 0
    Dim folder : Set folder = objFileSystem.GetFolder(strImportPath & "Forms\")
    Dim objFileSystem : Set objFileSystem = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    Dim file
    Dim strFormName
    For Each file in folder.Files
        objProgressWindow.Document.Body.InnerHTML = strOverallProgress & counter + 1 & " of " & folder.Files.Count
        strFormName = objFileSystem.GetBaseName(file.Name)
        objAccess.LoadFromText acForm, strFormName, file.Path
        counter = counter + 1
    Next
End Sub

Private Sub ImportReports(objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strImportPath, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Importing Reports (Step 3 of 5)...<br/>"
    Dim counter : counter = 0
    Dim folder : Set folder = objFileSystem.GetFolder(strImportPath & "Reports\")
    Dim objFileSystem : Set objFileSystem = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    Dim file
    Dim strReportName
    For Each file in folder.Files
        objProgressWindow.Document.Body.InnerHTML = strOverallProgress & counter + 1 & " of " & folder.Files.Count
        strReportName = objFileSystem.GetBaseName(file.Name)
        objAccess.LoadFromText acReport, strReportName, file.Path
        counter = counter + 1
    Next
End Sub

Private Sub ImportMacros(objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strImportPath, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Importing Macros (Step 4 of 5)...<br/>"
    Dim counter : counter = 0
    Dim folder : Set folder = objFileSystem.GetFolder(strImportPath & "Macros\")
    Dim objFileSystem : Set objFileSystem = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    Dim file
    Dim strMacroName
    For Each file in folder.Files
        objProgressWindow.Document.Body.InnerHTML = strOverallProgress & counter + 1 & " of " & folder.Files.Count
        strMacroName = objFileSystem.GetBaseName(file.Name)
        objAccess.LoadFromText acMacro, strMacroName, file.Path
        counter = counter + 1
    Next
End Sub

Private Sub ImportModules(objAccess, objDatabase, objProgressWindow, strImportPath, strOverallProgress)
    strOverallProgress = strOverallProgress & "Importing Modules (Step 5 of 5)...<br/>"
    Dim counter : counter = 0
    Dim folder : Set folder = objFileSystem.GetFolder(strImportPath & "Modules\")
    Dim objFileSystem : Set objFileSystem = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
    Dim file
    Dim strModuleName
    For Each file in folder.Files
        objProgressWindow.Document.Body.InnerHTML = strOverallProgress & counter + 1 & " of " & folder.Files.Count
        strModuleName = objFileSystem.GetBaseName(file.Name)
        objAccess.LoadFromText acModule, strModuleName, file.Path
        counter = counter + 1
    Next

    ' We need to compile the database whenever any module code changes.
    If Not objAccess.IsCompiled Then
        objAccess.RunCommand acCmdCompileAndSaveAllModules
    End If
End Sub