Resolving Microsoft Access version conflicts

Symptom: Your computer displays a message that says something like “The version of
MSAccess.exe has been moved or renamed” or “Office11 has been moved or renamed.”

What you are seeing is the result of a conflict between different versions of Microsoft
Access.

Cause:

The CHART application was developed using Microsoft Access 2003. The problem
occurs if there is another version of Access installed on your machine, either as part of
Microsoft Office or because another application has installed its own version of Access
(not Access 2003).

Problem:

In every operating system, there is a three or four-character extension of the file name
that indicates what program the system should use to open a file. Under Windows, it's a
three-digit extension like .mdb for Access files. Under the Mac OS it's a four-digit
extension that is hidden from the user, but there nevertheless.

For example, Word documents use an extension of “.doc”, Excel uses “.xls”, and Access
uses “.mdb”. Thus, when the operating system sees an extension of “.mdb” it knows that
it should use Microsoft Access to open the file. This process of telling the operating
system what application to use to open a file with a specific extension is called an
association.

The problem occurs when you have more than one version of Access (say, Access 97 and
Access 2000). When Windows looks at a file, it sees only the three-digit extension. When
you have more than one version of Access, however, Windows doesn’t know which
version to use, so it tries to guess. Here are the rules it uses:

When you double-click an Access database file in Windows Explorer, or when you click
an Access database file from the Recent Documents folder in Windows, the following
rules apply:

If a version of Access is running, the Access database file opens in that version.

If no version of Access is running, the Access database file opens the version of
Access that you most recently installed on your computer or the version of Access
that you last used on your computer. Every time you start Access, Access
registers itself as the version to load the Access database file with.

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Notice that these actions apply only to opening a file from Windows Explorer or from the
Start > Recent Documents list. The problem does not occur if you open a file directly
from one of your versions of Access.

Example: If you open Access 97 and then, from Access, select File > Open and open one
of your Access 97 databases, you will not see this behavior. Be sure, however, to make
sure you are opening a database in the same version of Access.

Solution:
Microsoft, of course, recommends that you never have more than one version of Access
installed on your machine. Here, we offer three strategies to resolve the conflicts.

Method 1: Temporary association

When you open a file from Windows Explorer, you can right-click it to select the Open
With option. If you right-click a file and select Open With from the pop-up menu, the
Open With window appears:

Notice that at the bottom of the list, you can choose whether to always use the program
you're selecting to open all files with the same extension (in the illustration: .mdb) or to

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use this program for only this specific file. This function is what Windows calls a feature
and the rest of us call a really annoying bug, but one we're stuck with.

You can also open the Open With window from any open folder:

1. From a Windows folder menu, select Tools > Folder Options and click on the File
Types tab.
2. Scroll down to the .mdb file type.

3. Click Change to open the Open With window.

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 4. Select the version of Access you want to use for files with a .mdb extension. If
you want to find a version not listed in the Open With window, click Browse.
5. Once the program as assigned, click OK.
6. Click Close.

Method 2: Permanent association

A cleaner alternative is to create a shortcut for each database file that points
Windows/Office to the specific version of Access you want to use. For example, here's
the shortcut target for the CHARTApp menu item that appears in Start > All Programs:

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\OFFICE11\MSACCESS.EXE" "C:\Program

Files\CHART\CHARTApp.mdb" /runtime

Here’s the basic structure of the shortcut. First, it tells Windows what version of
Office/Access to use. In the example above, we’re opening Access from Office11. The
rest of the shortcut opens the file itself, telling Windows to use only the runtime version
of Access. Be sure to enclose both parts of the shortcut in double-quotes.

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To make your own version of this shortcut for a file using a different version of Access,
first locate the correct version of Access on your hard drive. Enter the complete path
statement to that version of MSACCESS.EXE in the first part of the shortcut. In the
second part, enter the complete path statement for the file you want to open. If you’re
using a version of Access that came with an installation of Microsoft Office, leave off the
/runtime command.

If you're dealing with several databases using different versions of Access, you can create
similar shortcuts that tell Windows/Office exactly which version of Access to use for a
particular file. The advantage of this approach is that you can permanently associate a file
with a specific version of Access.

The trick here is finding the appropriate version of Access. We have heard of some cases
in which Access and Office 11 itself ended up in some unexpected directories. To make
sure you’re finding the correct version of Access, search on the Office directory, such as
Office11 or Office10, rather than on Access itself.

Method 3: Majority association

Yet another alternative is one we’ll call majority association. If you have a large
proportion of your databases that all use the same version of Access, use the association
method to define the .mdb extension as using that version of Access. You can then use
shortcuts or temporary associations for the remaining files.

References:

Microsoft does not recommend having more than one version of Office installed. One
reason is the sort of confused behavior reported here. For example, see the following
article:

Description of how to run multiple versions of Microsoft Access with Access 2003

Information about running multiple versions of Office with Office 2003

For more on associations, see:

Windows XP Annoyances for Geeks, p. 152, by David A. Karp, 2004.
Microsoft Windows User Experience, p. 286, Microsoft Press, 1999.

© DataStep Development, 2006

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