ACC: How to Change a Field's Data Type at Run Time with Code (128016)
The information in this article applies to:
- Microsoft Access 2.0
- Microsoft Access for Windows 95 7.0
- Microsoft Access 97
This article was previously published under Q128016
Moderate: Requires basic macro, coding, and interoperability skills.
SUMMARY
The DataType property of a field is not available in Visual Basic for
Applications, and the Size property of a field is read-only in a TableDef
object. Therefore, the data type of a field cannot be changed directly by
using Visual Basic for Applications at run time. However, you can change
the data type of a field by using a combination of Data Access Objects
(DAO) and Data Definition Language (DDL) in Visual Basic for Applications
code.
This article shows you how to create a sample user-defined Sub procedure
called AlterFieldType that uses DAO and DDL to change the data type of a
field at run time.
NOTE: You will have to delete and rebuild any relationships and indexes
that involve the changed field after you use this procedure.
This article assumes that you are familiar with Visual Basic for
Applications and with creating Microsoft Access applications using the
programming tools provided with Microsoft Access. For more information
about Visual Basic for Applications, please refer to your version of the
"Building Applications with Microsoft Access" manual.
NOTE: Visual Basic for Applications is called Access Basic in Microsoft
Access version 2.0. For more information about Access Basic, please refer
to the "Building Applications" manual.
REFERENCES
For more information about modifying tables using DDL, search the
Help Index for "ALTER TABLE."
Modification Type: | Minor | Last Reviewed: | 10/11/2006 |
---|
Keywords: | kbhowto kbProgramming KB128016 |
---|
|