Save a PDF to MySQL blob - Microsoft Access Forum


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Save a PDF to MySQL blob

Anne Tschider

3 years ago

In his Access front end, my client generates a letter that is emailed to their customer as a PDF (I used your video to build that VBA; it works great). The pdf of the letter also needs to be uploaded to a blob field in an existing ODBC table that resides on a MySQL database (that feeds a web-based dashboard). The MySQL table is a linked table in the Access front end. I'd like the generated PDF to be saved to it when the letter is emailed. An insert query is my guess but not sure how to reference the pdf being generated unless I save it to a folder first. I'm sure there's a better way! Thank you for any insight.

Kevin Yip @Reply

3 years ago

You most likely need to use a passthrough query for this. In a passthrough query, Access does not run the query, but simply passes an SQL statement to another server. And that's what you need to do to insert files into blob fields. Access doesn't know MySQL and can't run any MySQL-specific tasks. It can only pass through a statement to the MySQL server. In Access, go to Create -> Query Design -> click "Pass-Through" on the ribbon. On the property sheet, specify the "ODBC connection string" for your MySQL database. Then type an SQL statement using the syntax rules of MySQL.

As to the file path location, you need to use one that is recognizable by your MySQL server as well.

An INSERT query adds a new record to the table. If you need to add files to a blob field of an *existing* record, you need to use an UPDATE query.

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