Advice on connecting Access to SQL Azure with Dynamic IP addresses

[BiigJiim]

Hi,

I have an Access 2016 application which at present has a small table of data which I maintain by distributing an Access accdb with the updated table to my customers. I would like to change this so that the application looks at a SQL (or other) database over the internet.

Some of the customers are small businesses which do not have static IP addresses in their internet service.

Can anyone give me some pointers on the best way to do this? I looked at hosting an Azure SQL database, but it looks like the dynamic IP address issue is a problem with the Azure firewall rules.

Also if anyone knows any good resources for reading up on this, please let me know!

Thanks for reading and for any help,
Jim

 

[Gasman]

Sign up for a DNS service?
If you/your customers are happy to renew every 30 days, then the service would be free, but is not expensive anyway.

I use https://www.noip.com/

 

[theDBguy]

Hi,

I have an Access 2016 application which at present has a small table of data which I maintain by distributing an Access accdb with the updated table to my customers. I would like to change this so that the application looks at a SQL (or other) database over the internet.

Some of the customers are small businesses which do not have static IP addresses in their internet service.

Can anyone give me some pointers on the best way to do this? I looked at hosting an Azure SQL database, but it looks like the dynamic IP address issue is a problem with the Azure firewall rules.

Also if anyone knows any good resources for reading up on this, please let me know!

Thanks for reading and for any help,
Jim

Hi Jim. I'm not sure I understand the problem. What would IP addresses have to do with connecting to an Azure database?

 

[BiigJiim]

Hi Jim. I'm not sure I understand the problem. What would IP addresses have to do with connecting to an Azure database?

As far as I can work out, you have to configure the Azure firewall with a list of IP addresses that you want to connect from. Or am I reading this wrong?

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/az...#manage-firewall-rules-using-the-azure-portal

 

[Gasman]

Ah, the DNS service would appear not an option unless you can specify a url instead of ip address.

Sorry.

 

[Minty]

Gasman is on the right track, assuming the companies have a web site, you can use the Web site IP to do a fancy redirect based on the DNS records presented to it from memory.

To be brutally honest the cheapest route will be to get a fixed IP address, or use some form of hosted VPN that will present a fixed IP.

 

[theDBguy]

As far as I can work out, you have to configure the Azure firewall with a list of IP addresses that you want to connect from. Or am I reading this wrong?

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/az...#manage-firewall-rules-using-the-azure-portal

Hi. I have no idea how you got to that info page, but I wonder if it's applicable to you. I have set up Azure DBs before and have never had to mess with this setting. I can also access other Azure DBs created by someone else, and they never asked me for my IP address. By the way, I can access those DBs from home where I also use a dynamic IP.

 

[BiigJiim]

Found an interesting thread here where someone posted a very similar question. It might be for my purposes, AWS with MySQL might be the way to go.

https://access-programmers.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=288343

 

[theDBguy]

Found an interesting thread here where someone posted a very similar question. It might be for my purposes, AWS with MySQL might be the way to go.

https://access-programmers.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=288343

Hi Jim. Good luck. Let us know how it goes.