Question:
I have used several ADO data controls as well as one data environment designer in my app. This appears to “hardcode” the path to my database forcing me to install my app on a user’s computer in a directory structure similar to that which I have on my computer at design time. Is there some way to set the connectionstring and recordsource of these controls at runtime to something like App.path & “___.mdb”? Then the database path will be more generic. Or is this a drawback when using these rapid development tools?
Answer:
The accepted way to do this is to store the database path in the user’s registry. You can do this with most installation programs when the software is installed. You use the SaveSetting function to store a value to the registry, and the GetSetting function to retrieve the value. You can also use the API calls to write to other sections of the registry. Using the registry allows you to avoid hard-coding pathnames for databases right into your application.
