How can I retrieve a column description from MS ACCESS database using Java

Question

I am trying to retrieve column descriptions for MS Access columns using I am able to retrieve all columns of database like field name, data type.

I need description column data using Java.

Kindly give some suggestion or guidance.

Note: I used this code to get column name

public ArrayList<String> fetchtable(String value)
{       
    try
    {
       makeConnection();
       String str1="Select * from "+ value;
       ResultSet rs = st.executeQuery(str1);
       rsmd = rs.getMetaData();
       NumOfCol= rsmd.getColumnCount();
       for(int i=1;i<=NumOfCol;i++)
       {
          ColumnName = rsmd.getColumnName(i);
          System.out.println(ColumnName);
          columns.add(ColumnName);
        }       
        //System.out.println("Columns Valuessss is:" +columns);         
        }catch(Exception ae){
            ae.printStackTrace();
        }
        return columns;
    }

Gord Thompson · Accepted Answer · 2014-05-14 13:26:53Z

1

The only way I know to retrieve a field's Description is via Microsoft DAO. One way to do that would be to have the Java program

write a little VBScript,
execute it, and
capture the results,

something like this:

package com.example.getaccessfielddescription;

import java.io.*;

public class Main {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        // test data
        String dbFileSpec = "C:\\Users\\Public\\Database1.accdb";
        String tableName = "Clients";
        String fieldName = "LastName";

        String vbsFilePath = System.getenv("TEMP") + "\\GetAccessFieldDescription.vbs";
        File vbsFile = new File(vbsFilePath);
        PrintWriter pw;
        try {
            pw = new PrintWriter(vbsFile);
            pw.println("Set dbe = CreateObject(\"DAO.DBEngine.120\")");
            pw.println("Set db = dbe.OpenDatabase(\"" + dbFileSpec + "\")");
            pw.println("Set fld = db.TableDefs(\"" + tableName + "\").Fields(\"" + fieldName + "\")");
            pw.println("WScript.Echo fld.Properties(\"Description\").Value");
            pw.println("Set fld = Nothing");
            pw.println("Set db = Nothing");
            pw.println("Set dbe = Nothing");
            pw.close();

            Process p = Runtime.getRuntime().exec("cscript /nologo \"" + vbsFilePath + "\"");
            p.waitFor();
            BufferedReader rdr = 
                    new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(p.getInputStream()));
            String fieldDescription = rdr.readLine();

            vbsFile.delete();

            System.out.println(fieldDescription);
        } catch (Exception e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }

}

answered May 14, 2014 at 13:26

Gord Thompson

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2 Comments

user3599755 Over a year ago

Your approach is excellent, I just want to know whether this approach is feasible for servlet also. Thank you

Gord Thompson Over a year ago

@user3599755 If you're talking about using the above approach on a web server then there would probably be some permissions issues that would need to be sorted out. The account under which a web server runs is usually prohibited from running arbitrary code.

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