How to change a vb6 pc app using windows forms to run on a Lan?

Question

I have a vb6 application installed on 3 pc's at a small company. I want to change it to run on the company's LAN (where the access database is stored). It uses an MDI form, embedded MS Word and stores/retrieves registry information for user options. It also can create an excel file and send output to a printer.
What do I have to change?
Is writing something for the Web using ASP forms that same as what's needed for the LAN?
Can the windows forms I wrote be used?
I use VS installer to create the setup.exe, what's used for the LAN?
What about the registry used by the setup.exe and my program It's used on each PC, how will that work with a shared program on the LAN?
Is there a book to explain this?

Thanks.
PS. I learned how to write this app from a teach-yourself visual basic book a few years ago. So pardon me for not knowing much.

Answer 1

I believe you can change your connection string to point to the LAN folder where the Access database resides. Given the small number of users this should work. This is not the ideal way of doing a client/server type application, but it works and should give you a result in the least amount of time.

You need to make sure every PC connecting to the LAN uses the same drive letter for the connection. Access does not seem to remember the UNC approach for identifying a LAN connection, only the drive letter.

Also, running this way can be slower since this pushes a lot of communication traffic across the connection for the Access database.

The next step in the world of VB6 would be to write a COM+ object that runs on a Microsoft server. You must use the Enterprise edition of VB6 in order to have the required tools.

Depending upon your environment you may be better off moving to a newer version of VB.NET and perhaps running this as a web application with IIS/ASP.NET rather than as a Windows application. Moving to the newer environment provides better approaches (for example, web services) over the COM+ approach.