The Database Link tab of a Database Linkage entry houses the information to connect to the data source.

Description: is any descriptive phrase that identifies the linkage to you, including spaces.

Database: is the file name of the database in the client directory. If the file is not in the client directory, the full path and name are displayed. You can click on the Browse button to search for the database. When using a non-password protected Microsoft Access database, you can leave the ADO Connection String (*) blank. In that case, either a Microsoft Jet Engine (for *.mdb) or a Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0 (for *.accdb) connection string will be assumed. 

ADO Connection String (*) Microsoft Access, Microsoft Excel and SQL Server are data sources which use an ADO connection String. Examples of the strings can be found in Linking to Microsoft Access 2007, Linking to Microsoft Excel, Linking to SQL Server, Linking to Sybase and Linking to Text Files, which can all be found in the Database Linkage section of the FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) topic.

* A blank connection string will default to the Microsoft Jet Engine or the default Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0. The ADO Connection String (*) will only be blank when the Database Path and Name are to Microsoft Access 2000, 2002 or 2003 which use Microsoft Jet Engine, or for Microsoft Access 2007 and later, which can use Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0 (also see Linking to Microsoft Access 2007). 

If you specify both a Database and an ADO Connection String, the database name is appended to the ADO Connection String ​as ";Data Source=" + database path and name when an attempt is made to access the data. For example, if the client directory is C:\myFolder\ ,myAccessfile.accdb was specified as the Database and Provider=Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0;Persist Security Info=False; as the ADO Connection String, ProAdmin would use Provider=Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0;Persist Security Info=False;Data Source=C:\myFolder\myAccessfile.accdb as the final connection string.

Once a connection string is encrypted, there is no way to un-encrypt it. Should there be a problem with an encrypted connection, you'll get a general message that there is a problem with your encrypted connection string and to please contact your system administrator. (This was done to prevent encrypted information about the database connection being shown in various ADO error messages.) To determine what is actually causing the problem, you or your system administrator will need to temporarily use an un-encrypted connection string to see the actual ADO error details.

If you specify the userid and/or password in the connection string, you don't have to include the actual userid and/or password: you can use <promptuserid> and/or <promptpassword>. These parameters must be all lower case, and you use them in the connection string like this: ;User ID=<promptuserid>; Password=<promptpassword>. Then, the first time you connect to the database, you will be prompted for the userid and/or password, and then during the rest of that session, the prompted userid and/or password will be automatically supplied. Every time you logout out of ProAdmin or switch clients, all prompted userids and passwords are destroyed, and you will be re-prompted the first time you next connect to the database.  

ADO Database Password is only necessary if an ADO Database User ID above is used. If you are using this feature, ;Password= plus the password you specified will be appended to the connection string (e.g., Password=MyPassword;). If your database uses a different keyword for the password (e.g., PSWD= or Jet OLEDB:Database Password= instead of Password=), then you have to specify the password in the connection string.