[AccessD] Lock-screen inside an Access app

Thanks, JC. My friend is an occasional visitor to this group, and has been
here enough to know some of the more frequent names. I told him when he
asked that you and/or Shamil would know how to do this. I'm forwarding your
message to my friend now.

I'm not sure how, in the absence of an entire framework, he should create
the wrappers for mouse-move and click, but maybe the keydown will be enough
for his requirements.

So it would work something like this?

Form is hidden. Timer sees no keystrokes for say 10 minutes, then makes the
form visible in dialog mode. Counts password attempts to three. If still no
valid password, then Application.Shutdown; else hide the form and let the
user proceed.

I'm a tad concerned about the timer continuing to operate while the user is
using the app. Won't it interfere with things? On the other hand, I can't
think how else it might work, since the user could conceivably walk away
leaving the cursor in the middle of some field while he was adding a new
customer or something.

Arthur


On 5/3/07, JWColby <jwcolby at colbyconsulting.com> wrote:
>
> The issue here is "minutes of inactivity".  In order to measure time in
> Access a form somewhere has to be running a timer.
>
> There is absolutely nothing AFAIK built in to Access that "measures
> activity".  In order to measure activity... You have to define activity.
> Mouse movements?  Keystrokes?  These are the two most common.  Keystrokes
> are fairly easy, you intercept the key down and set a "last activity time"
> global date variable.  Mouse movement however is much harder.
>
> For that you will need a framework which uses class wrappers around forms
> and controls (or at least the form).  Having that you can sink the mouse
> move event for the form and controls and set the same global "last
> activity
> time" global date variable.
>
> Having a "last activity time" variable you can now use that timer tick I
> mentioned in the second sentence to see how long since the last activity.
>
> All in all not a 10 minute project, but it is doable.
>
> John W. Colby
> Colby Consulting
> www.ColbyConsulting.com
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
> [mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Arthur Fuller
> Sent: Thursday, May 03, 2007 7:53 AM
> To: Access Developers discussion and problem solving
> Subject: [AccessD] Lock-screen inside an Access app
>
> A friend asked me how he could put a Windows-like screen lock (that asks
> for
> a password) inside an Access app. He's thinking that it's a hidden form
> that
> then appears after x minutes of inactivity and wants a password before
> letting the user back into the app. Presumably it would shut the app down
> with no valid password.
>
> Does anyone have an idea how to do this?
>
> TIA,
> Arthur
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