Sending a report electronically

Sending a report electronically

Often it is useful or necessary to send data from the database in an electronic format. There are many ways of doing this in Access. You can:

Use the SnapShot viewer;
Use a PDF file;
Use an HTML page;
Use a text file;
Use a Word document;
Use a Rich Text File.

However, you need to consider who the information is going to. If you are sending it internally, chances are that they will have the same software set up as you, so using a Word Document would be OK. If you are sending it to an outside organisation on a regular basis, you might want to consider using the Snapshot, and providing them with the Snapshot viewer.

If however, you are sending it outside your organisation to variable people, then you will need to choose the lowest common denominator, which would probably be a text file. All of the other solutions pre-suppose the presence of various software on the end-users system, and if they don't have this software already, then they will need to obtain it (yes, there is a WordViewer and Snapshot viewer on the MS site, and yes, PDF and HTML readers are readily available, but why should a possible customer have to go to extra trouble just to view a catalogue?)

With a text file, you will lose the formatting, but if you use VBA rather than just TransferText, you can create something other than a CSV file.

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Last modified at 06/06/2006 15:00:52