Password-Protected Native Access Product Databases

QuoteWerks can link to QuoteWerks native product databases that have been password protected. The advantage to password protecting a native product database is security. When a native product database is password protected, no one (including the system administrator) can add, edit, or delete products from that product database. This is different from Misc Access right security features (described in User Maintenance and Security) that allow you to specify which users are allowed to add, edit, or delete products from product databases

You may want to use one or the other or both of these security features depending upon your needs. The best use of the password protected database is when you want to distribute a product database to other QuoteWerks locations for them to use to put together quotes, but you do not want to allow them to modify the database, or even open the database directly using Microsoft Access.

To setup a password protected database, follow these steps. First, use the “Password protecting a native Access product database” instructions below. Next, give the database to the other QuoteWerks location. At the other QuoteWerks location, the database can be linked to QuoteWerks. When you select the database to link it to QuoteWerks, QuoteWerks will ask for a password to use to open the password protected product database. This is where it gets tricky. QuoteWerks requires the password so that it can gain access to the database, but you do not want to give the user the password to enter into QuoteWerks, because then the user would know the password. The following describes how to work around this issue. When you link to the database and enter a password using QuoteWerks, QuoteWerks encrypts the password and saves it with the database link information in the \QuoteWerks\dsources.mdb file. So, after you link to your password protected database, you can look in the Data Sources table of the dsources.mdb file to find the encrypted version of your password in the DbPassword field. You can then give the password protected database to the user along with the encrypted password. When the user links to the database and QuoteWerks asks for the password, the user needs to supply the word “DECRYPT” and then the encrypted password, so if the encrypted password is xYZ, the user would type in DECRYPTxYZ.

Linking to a Password-Protected Product Database

After you have set the database password for the database, exit Microsoft Access and start QuoteWerks. Follow the instructions above for “Linking to Existing Native Product Databases” with 1 exception. When you choose the password protected database to link to, a window will be displayed that asks for the password for the database. Enter the password.

Password-Protecting a Native Access Product Database

This is an advanced feature that requires that you have a copy of Microsoft Access 2002/2003. To password protect a QuoteWerks native product database; first make sure that no one is running QuoteWerks. Also, if the native product database that you want to password protect is already linked in QuoteWerks, you must remove the link first. Then, using Microsoft Access 2002/2003, select File -> Open, choose the QuoteWerks native product database, and checkmark the “Exclusive” checkbox. This will open the database in Microsoft Access. Next, select the Tools -> Security -> Set Database Password and enter a password for this database. Database passwords in Microsoft Access are CASE-SENSITIVE. Please note that if you forget your password, there is no way to recover it, and you will become locked out of your own database. Be very careful when using this feature.