Maybe I can put it a slightly different way for you. Could be you've been hacking databases so long that you are programmers, and don't know it. The fact that you thought of this and feel comfortable with the idea leads me to think so. OTOH I couldn't agree more with the other postings; to put it plainly I'd recommend working with Drupal straight out, and going from there. Doing uber-tricky stuff like working directly on the backend database is really advanced, and for a beginner the odds of it leading to pain and suffering are high. Just my two cents. Marty At 01:43 PM 6/7/2012, Metzler, David wrote:

I am not suggesting you do data synchronization, but that you implement code that modifies the same mysql tables modified by access, OUTSIDE of the drupal node schema. You could write a custom module to do this. Yes you will need to learn the drupal forms api, but that is small compared to the access code you will need to write to get the fields in the node and revisions tables consistent.

IF you are not programmers, what you are suggesting is not technically feasible anyway, as you will have to do quite a bit of programming to get the data in the node tables correct. It's not something you can just point an access form at and expect it to work.

I agree with Earnie, the best advice is to hire a developer/consultant to work through this with/for you. Or to convince your Access users to modify the data in drupal instead of the access.

Good luck,

Dave

-----Original Message----- From: support-bounces@drupal.org [mailto:support-bounces@drupal.org] On Behalf Of Earnie Boyd Sent: Thursday, June 07, 2012 10:38 AM To: support@drupal.org Subject: Re: [support] Create and manage content directly from the database.

On Thu, Jun 7, 2012 at 1:23 PM, Wipe_Out <wipe_out@users.sourceforge.net> wrote:

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You don't want to update the node tables directly. You would miss out on the hook implementations. You need to create a node object and use node_save() to do it. You could manage this by creating a custom module to push and pull the changes to an external DB for the ms access entries via a hook_cron implementation. There may be a module already to do this but I don't know.

What are the hook implementations you mention specifically??

I can only point you to the technical documentation. http://api.drupal.org/api/drupal/includes%21module.inc/group/hooks/7

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If the data tables are all updated correctly will drupal not see it as a node?

I doubt that you'll be able to update the tables correctly but not all that is Drupal will not know that you created the node so "correctly" is suspect to begin with.

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As mentioned we aren't programmers so this seemed like the easier option..

Then please hire someone to do it. See consulting@drupal.org and http://groups.drupal.org/jobs for posting an opportunity.

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My concern with trying to write something to keep two sets of data "syncronised" is managing the whole syncronisation process and issues with changes happening on both sides causing a "split brain" scenario.. If both access interfaces are editing the same data this is reduced.. No different to why MySQL replication is not often attempted as master-master because the sync is not easy to do reliably..

But the syncing scenario is the only reliable way to do it, IMO. Or, teach the administrators to use the Drupal interface to do their changes instead of MS Access.

-- Earnie -- https://sites.google.com/site/earnieboyd -- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ] -- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]