Hi Richard,

The book, Access Solutions: Tips and Tricks, has chapter about backing up and restoring an Access Db to and from text files using VBA (minus the tables, which it advises to be linked). It seems like a g r e a t and simple idea - but I cant get it to work. Heh - it assumes a level of knowledge I just don't have yet.

I would love to see a lesson on how to properly back up and restore a Db using this method or a similar one.

Thanks for your great work.

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Reply from Richard Rost:

Honestly, I've always found the BEST backup solution is just to run a program nightly that copies all of the files from one folder to another one, preferably on a different physical disk drive. I wrote a little program YEARS ago to perform a simple file-based backup. Not sure if this program works with Windows 7 (never tried it) but I still use it on my Windows 2000 and XP machines (where my work data is stored).

There are also several great online backup programs available as well. I personally use iDrive Online Backup. It runs as a background service and then once a day (or whenever you schedule) it backs up your selected files. You can get up to 5 GB of storage for free, and then if you want more it's reasonably priced. 5 GB is plenty of space for all of my critical database files.

I do like your idea, however. I'll put a special seminar for backing up your databases on my list.