Data OLEDB object - change history

[Walter.Koller]

Hello,

I downloaded the most recent version of Data OLEDB object from DX. There seem to be no change but the switch from ACE to JET. Unfortunately all documents still refer to ACE (eg requirements).

I tried to figure out the reason and the impact but a quick search turned out to be more confusing than helpful. eg some text say JET was replaced by ACE; other talk about ACE being just an implementation of JET. 

Any insight in this topic is much appreciated. 

Regards

[david.l.morris · Accepted solution]

ACE is definitely the better/newer way. It is compatible for use from 32bit or 64bit Blue Prism, but JET can only be used from 32bit Blue Prism. The main issue with this change is that JET can query both .xls and .xlsx files, whereas ACE can only query .xlsx files.

Going to Blue Prism 7 if you go to 64bit Blue Prism means you need to switch to an OLEDB object that only supports ACE basically.

Other than that, I have not noticed any problems. We updated our OLEDB object to force use of ACE, and all our automations that were using JET still worked after making the change. This of course does not apply to any that were using xls. We had to make adjustments for xls by just using the Excel VBO to read/write in those.

Edit: Check the object you downloaded from the DX again. It "should" have been a switch from JET to ACE, not the other way around.

[ewilson · Accepted solution]

Hi @Walter.Koller 

The only change that's been made to the OLEDB connector in the last year or so was the move from JET, as the default connection provider, to ACE. As @david.l.morris pointed out, this was necessary due to the release of the true 64-bit Blue Prism client under v7.2 as JET only supports 32-bit applications.

Cheers,
Eric

[Walter.Koller]

@ewilson @david.l.morris Thanks for clarifying. 

There were several things that confused me. 

• we already switched to ACE some time ago and when comparing the newest version of OLEDB VBO it seems I diff'd against a very old version left in some of our sandbox environments, that still used JET.
• Wiki is talking about JET throughout the article, 'ACE Driver/Provider was introduced, which in essence provides a 64-bit version of Jet.'; 'Microsoft provides the JET drivers for Microsoft Windows only and third party software support for JET databases is almost exclusively found on Windows'

Sorry for confusion and many thanks for your great support!