Auto FE Updater

(Thanks to DR.) Shortcut files usually do not have the .lnk visible even though you've unselected "Hide extensions for known file types." from within Windows Explorer. So when you look at directory using Windows Explorer do you see the .lnk extension? With the default settings in Windows you shouldn't actually see the .lnk extension although it is present. Thus what might be happening is the file actually ends in .lnk.lnk with the second .lnk hidden from view. You can also verify this by going to the command prompt in that directory and doing a "dir *.lnk".

The permissions aren't setup properly on MSVBVM60.DLL in your Windows System32 folder. Thanks to Ray Zorz for locating this problem.

Very likely you need to register the DAO DLL specific to your version of Access. If Access 2000, 2002 or 2003 it is DAO360.DLL. If Access 97 it is DAO350.DLL.

For example, at a command prompt or the Run ... menu item on the Windows Start button , key in regsvr32 "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\DAO\DAO360.DLL" with the double quotes.

Note that Don Barton reported that this problem was specific to one particular user. He could log on to the system and all was well but the particular user was having this problem. Once he logged on as administrator he ran the above regsvr32 and the user was now working just fine.

Run Internet Explorer >> Tools >> Options >> Security tab. Under Trusted Sites add the name of the server (or your domain) to the list of trusted sites. Note that this happened on a Terminal Server system. The interesting thing is that the user could run a .cmd file which executed StartMDB.exe just fine. But they couldn't run the shortcut which executed StartMDB.exe.

This is a security risk as anyone could then load any executable onto the server.

Windows Vista has locked down the Common Programs and Common desktop so that only administrators can add or update new shortcuts. While I could allow this to be done by the administrator in the future you might want a user to update the shortcut. Now you would have to log on to their system to do so. I chose to not allow this at all. If this is a problem send me an email and we'll come up with a solution.

The StartMethod=FileExtension is using an API call has trouble with file extensions longer than three characters. This is fixed in version 1.78. Karl Peterson, former VB 6 MVP, wrote an article on this problem I discovered - Finding an Associated Executable The MSDN article describing this API call has also been updated

Fixed in version 1.78.

Use StartMethod=FileExtension which is new in version 1.77

Note that DAO version does not necessarily match the Jet version."

You need to register the DAO dll using regsvr32. For example, using Start >> Run and keying (or copying) regsvr32 "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\DAO\DAO360.DLL". The double quotes are required on any folder/directory which has spaces in it.

This message is from an older version of the utility. Installing the latest version will give you a much clearer messag

This was due to a typo on my part in the decryption code and typically showed up in a mixed environment of Windows 2000 and Windows XP workstations. The latest version fixes this problem. My apologies for taking so long to notice the typo.

This message should not be appearing any more. I'm now doing much more verification to ensure files mentioned in the INI file exist before attempting to copy or access them. If you are using a recent version and are still getting this message please email me.

This means the program can't find a file or directory. This can be the ini file location specified in the shortcut or any of the other lines. One common problem is to place the FE MDE name on the Server line in the INI file. The Server line should just be a directory.

You are running a very old version. Newer versions have much better error checking. The file specified in the MainApp line in the INI file is not in the server directory and thus is not being copied down to the workstation.

Download a newer version of the Auto FE Updater utility. This problem is due to user not having sufficient permissions on the MDB file being downloaded for the method I was using to determine the MDB version. This was fixed in V1.65.

You are running an old version of the utility. Please upgrade to the latest version as the error message is much friendlier.

Download VB 6.0 SP6 from Microsoft at VBRun60sp6.exe installs Visual Basic 6.0 SP6 run-time files . The original version is at VBRun60.exe installs Visual Basic 6.0 run-time files .

Update to a newer version. When you look at the target of the shortcut created it looks like 'C:\"\\\StartMDB.exe"'. This was fixed in V1.65.

Technical details: NT 4.0 SP 6 has a bug where, if you have spaces in the UNC path and name, which require double quotes around the path and StartMDB.exe, and you are creating a shortcut, it inserts a C: in the UNC path and name. As in C:\"\\ when it should be \\ServerName. Wierd. This doesn't happen in Windows 2000 or newer. The work around is for you, the developer, to create the shortcut on the server and then copy down the correct shortcut. If you are running NT 4.0 yourself then you must manually fix the shortcut yourself once it's been created.

The MDB/MDE is secured and requires an Access user account, password and security workgroup file in order for the utility to determine the version of Access.

This message has now been replaced with a much more detailed message in version 1.66. You can also now set the MDWFile, MDWAccount and MDBPassword entries to allow the Auto FE Updater utility to access the secured MDB/MDE to determine the Access version of the file.