Hello Rick
I like to split databases to facilitate updating front ends but the two concerns I have for my less techy users are:
Compacting the back end - how can I do that from the front end?
The other concern is when table structure changes, how do I manage that? Is there a clever way to re-link the tables after an update to the front end? Yes, I know about the Link Table Manager but that is too scarey for some of my users.
So a seminar on managing split databases would be very welcome.
Regards
Chris

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Reply from Richard Rost:

Compacting the back-end is something that's done as a weekly maintenance event, by you, manually. There is VBA code I've tried using before to compact it, but it's unreliable in my opinion. This is just one of those things I recommend you schedule some time for, once a week (or even once a month, depending on how much your db gets used), kick everyone offline, and quickly run a compact on the server.

Table changes can be manipulated using DAO (recordsets) which I haven't covered yet, but I will when I get to the Developer series. You can change them with SQL commands (see SQL Seminar, Part 3) but those commands have to be issued on the "server" machine, and not from a linked database. I've done it before using a "main menu" form that stays open on the server and can issue remote commands like this. Kind of tricky, but it works. DAO is much better.

I'll add these two suggestions to the list (along with the other requests I've gotten) and perhaps I'll put together more on this in an upcoming seminar.