Access™ 2007 VBA Programmer's Reference

6.10. Managing Access (JET) Security with DAO

Security in Access is based on the workgroup model, which is conceptually similar to the user-level security model employed by the Windows operating system. In contrast to database-level security models employed by other desktop database systems, Access workgroup information is stored in a file that can reside on a network share. Using this approach, the same security system can be shared by many databases, rather than having to create a separate security system for every instance of your database. It enables you to simplify security maintenance by adding or removing users and groups, or changing permissions in one centralized file.

Microsoft Access security is always present and always enabled; it is not something that can be disabled. You just don't notice it because of the default workgroup and several default users and groups.

Because DAO acts only as an interface to security in the Access database engine, a detailed discussion of this security model is beyond the scope of this book. For those who want to learn about Access database engine security in greater detail, there are several excellent books on the subject that you can read. This chapter discusses only those aspects of the DAO object model that directly relate to security; specifically how to manage users, groups, and permissions in the Access database engine using code.

NOTE

Beginning with Access 2007, user-level security is no longer supported for new file formats. This ...