Is there a way to do this?

[eatcress]

Hello Everyone,

I am wondering if any if you wonderful people could advise me on a potential project I am considering.

What i would ideally like is for there to be an Access database hosted online that has some VBA which at regular times scrapes data and updates itself. I would then have some front end access/excel applications that run locally (and can be distributed to other people) which can connect to this central data source, and also allows them to update it.

Ultimately, I would like to know if this is feasible. I have been looking online but cant really seem to get a concrete answer.

I suppose some potential options could be to have a host which has an access database instance on it, or maybe a virtual server? The other option would be to use Azure/SQL Server instead? Whatever the best option is the 2 main issues which i have is:

1. Can it be left alone to run some VBA or VB code on it on a timer?
2. Can it be easily connected to by a front end application (kinda of like a standard Access application split, but the back end is hosted online)?

If anyone here could give me some advice on this, it would be much appreciated

Thanks in advance.

[OBP]

I would expect an SQL server backend with Access front ends to be the best option.
As to the automatic updating I don't know if SQL servers do that, but one of the Access front ends can run the VBA, but the MS Scheduler would need to open the database at the sepcified time to run the VBA code.

[Bob Phillips]

You could also use Power Query/Power Pivot to access it from Excel.

[Rich-YCP]

Consider using something like a MySQL back end which will avoid the need for a specific server online - a lot of hosting companies can offer this type of hosting as standard. Combine this with the ODBC connectors to allow your Access or Excel front ends to access the data in the normal way - you will effectively see your online tables as local tables the same as any other linked table - tho be careful of size and design because data access speeds will be much slower than normal