Chapter 15: Changing theAccess Environment

In the previous chapter, you learned how to manipulate command bars (menus and toolbars) using VBA. That changed how you could interact with Access. In this chapter, you will see how to change other environmental settings by using VBA. We are going to look at some simple startup procedures as well as changing and restoring default information. The second half of the chapter contains tables that you can use as a handy reference.

The Startup Properties

On several occasions you have already encountered the database startup properties. You can access them from the Database window by selecting Tools | Startup. You will see the dialog box shown in Figure 15-1.

Figure 15-1: The database startup properties dialog box

Interestingly, each item in this box has a VBA equivalent. Table 15-1 lists the startup properties that correspond to the Startup dialog box interface items and the type of values they are.

Table 15-1: VBA Equivalents of Startup Properties

Property	VBA Equivalent	Data Type
Application Title	AppTitle	String
Application Icon	AppIcon	String (Image name)
Display Form	StartupForm	String (Form name)
Display Database Window	StartupShowDBWindow	Boolean
Display Status Bar	StartupShowStatusBar	Boolean
Menu Bar	StartupMenuBar	Menu bar name
Shortcut Menu Bar	StartupShortcutMenuBar	Shortcut menu bar name
Allow Full Menus	AllowFullMenus	Boolean
Allow Default Shortcut Menus	AllowShortcutMenus	Boolean
Allow Built-in Toolbars	AllowBuiltinToolBars	Boolean
Allow Toolbar/Menu Changes	AllowToolBarChanges	Boolean
Allow viewing of code after an error (Note: While not specifically listed in the dialog box, this shuts off controls to access the code.)	AllowBreakIntoCode	Boolean
Use Access Special Keys	AllowSpecialKeys	Boolean

The following code shows an example of changing some startup properties using the current database as the object.

Public Sub startupProperties()   Dim myDatabase As Object    Set myDatabase = CurrentDb    myDatabase.Properties("AllowFullMenus") = True   myDatabase.Properties("Allowtoolbarchanges") = True   End Sub 

If you try to run this code and you get an error message, open the Startup dialog box and click OK. This lets Access populate the properties of the Application and Database objects as needed.

When you run the code, nothing seems to happen. However, try changing the two Boolean values to False as follows:

Public Sub startupProperties()   Dim myDatabase As Object   Set myDatabase = CurrentDb    myDatabase.Properties("AllowFullMenus") = False   myDatabase.Properties("Allowtoolbarchanges") = False   End Sub 

If you now open the dialog box, notice that those fields are toggled off, as shown in Figure 15-2.

Figure 15-2: The Startup dialog box with fields clicked off

You can reset any values you set with the following code:

Public Sub startupProperties()   Dim myDatabase As Object    Set myDatabase = CurrentDb    With myDatabase   .Properties.Delete "AllowFullMenus"   .Properties.Delete "AllowToolBarChanges"   End With    Application.RefreshTitleBar  End Sub