Exporting an array of custom objects into Access table - ms-access

Question

I have a timesheet system in excel with 3 rows (standard time, overtime, double time) for each of our (100+) employees, and one column for each cost code on the site. This ends up being a giant matrix, most of which is empty. My solution is to basically create an employee datatype which stores the employee information and hours for a single cost code.
Public Type Employee
Name As String
Trade(1 To 3) As String
EmpNum As Long
Comment As String
AddOns(1 To 3) As Single
Allowance(1 To 3) As Single
Contract As Long
CostCode As Long
STHours As Single
OTHours As Single
DTHours As Single
WorkDate As Date
End Type
I can process the spreadsheet and organize the information in excel as an array of employee-type objects, but I'm not familiar with how to export this into Access, and most questions relate to exporting from excel cells to Access. I can obviously put these objects into cells on another worksheet and do it that way, but it seems like there should be a better way.
Currently my best guess is something like this:
Insert data form Excel to Access 2010 using VBA
but then I'd be making 100+ updates to the table for each export.
Is there an efficient way to create a table object in VBA, populate it with the array information, and then append it to the end of my table in Access in a single update?
Thanks.
-Sean

Answer 1

The easiest way is to create a table link in Access. Table links look like tables in the rest of Access, but the data is stored externally. The data could be inside another Access database, or inside a SQL Server database, or what have you.
In particular, the data can be in an Excel spreadsheet. Define a table in Excel that contains the data in the format that's right for your Access application. Then build a table link in Access that links back to the table you defined in Excel.
When you update the Excel table, the updated results will automatically appear the next time you reference the table link in Access.

Answer 2

thanks for the help from everyone ... I just wanted to share what I came up with for a solution. I ended up building a function to insert one object into the database ... copied and modified from the interwebs. Code below, cheers!
Public Function InsertTimeRecord(EmpData As Employee) As Boolean
Dim SaveTime As Date
Dim db As DAO.Database
Dim rs As DAO.Recordset
'//Database Location
Const DB_LOCATION = "C:\access\KMP Tracker.mdb"
'//If errors occur the function will exit with a return value of false (insertion failed)
On Error GoTo ErrHandler:
'//Table has a datecreated/datemodified timestamp for each record
SaveTime = Now
'//Open Database
If db Is Nothing Then
Set db = DAO.Workspaces(0).OpenDatabase("C:\access\KMP Tracker.mdb") 'Removed DB_LOCATION
End If
'//Open Table
If rs Is Nothing Then
Set rs = db.OpenRecordset("Timesheet Data", dbOpenDynaset)
End If
'//Create a new record
With rs
.AddNew
![EmpName] = EmpData.Name
![Trade1] = EmpData.Trade(1)
![Trade2] = EmpData.Trade(2)
![Trade3] = EmpData.Trade(3)
![EmpNum] = EmpData.EmpNum
![Comment] = EmpData.Comment
![AddOns1] = EmpData.AddOns(1)
![AddOns2] = EmpData.AddOns(2)
![AddOns3] = EmpData.AddOns(3)
![Allowance1] = EmpData.Allowance(1)
![Allowance2] = EmpData.Allowance(2)
![Allowance3] = EmpData.Allowance(3)
![Contract] = EmpData.Contract
![CostCode] = EmpData.CostCode
![STHours] = EmpData.STHours
![OTHours] = EmpData.OTHours
![DTHours] = EmpData.DTHours
![WorkDate] = EmpData.WorkDate
![DateSubmitted] = SaveTime
'//Insert Record into Database
.Update
InsertMachineHoursRecord = True '//SUCCESSFUL INSERTION
End With
'//Note that we use recordset in this example, but equally effective
'// is to create an update query command text and simply run the update query:
'// (INSERT INTO Table (Field1, Field2) VALUES (Value1, Value2);
'//Make sure we have closed the database
My_Exit:
rs.Close
Set rs = Nothing
db.Close
Set db = Nothing
Exit Function
ErrHandler:
MsgBox Err.Description
Resume My_Exit
End Function