Creating a Development Version of LIMSCODE

Summary

The information in this article applies to LIMS 1.x and Access 2.0.

Follow the procedures outlined in this article to create your own version of the LIMS software. Use this development version to create and test new bench sheets, reports, and other customizations.

More Information

LIMS users who choose to customize and want to explore the Access development environment and the LIMS software should always maintain separate production and development versions of the LIMSCODE front end database. Follow the procedures below to create your own copy of LIMSCODE for testing and development:

1. Using File Manager at one of the workstations that has a copy of MS Access, create your own version of LIMSCODE by copying LIMSCODE.MDB to LIMSTEST.MDB in the C:\ACCESS\LIMS directory. To do this, highlight LIMSCODE.MDB and choose Copy from the File menu.

2. Create a new Program Manager icon by copying an existing LIMS icon (hold down the control key while dragging the icon to a new location).

3. Change the properties of the new icon by single-clicking and selecting Properties from Program Manager’s File menu. Change the description to something meaningful (e.g. “My Development LIMS”). In the command line field, change “d:\dir\MSARN200.EXE” to “d:\access\MSACCESS.EXE” where “d:\access” is the drive/directory where Access 2.0 is installed (not the Access runtime included with LIMS). In the command line field also change “LIMSCODE.MDB” to “LIMSTEST.MDB”.

To open the development version, double-click on the new icon and log on as LIMSAdmin. You will see “LIMSTEST” in the database window’s title bar. To enter the Access development environment you must use the LIMSAdmin account. The LIMS initialization software will bypass the automatic display of the main menu when LIMSAdmin is used with a full copy of Access. Note that this configuration is still accessing the production LIMSDATA database. During testing you may also want to use a test version of LIMSDATA.