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Knowledge base article 82

Creating a database of hyperlinks

Suppose you want to use database to store information that has some associated external file or image or web site.

You can use a database field to store the location of the external file and the use the HYPERLINK function to provide a connection to the file.

Here's how to do it:

  1. Start Database and open (or create a new) database
  2. Select File/New/Table
  3. Select Blank table
  4. Create four fields:
    htitleCharacter
    hpathCharacterClick Format and set Width to 255
    hlinkCalculatedClick Format and set Formula to:
    =HYPERLINK(hpath, htitle)
    DescriptionMemo
  5. Save the table

Now, whatever you type into the hpath field can be loaded when in form view. For example, suppose you have an image stored in My Documents called photo1.jpg, then set:
htitle: Photo1
hpath: C:\Documents and Settings\Phil\My Documents\photo1.jpg
Description: Holiday snap

Open the table in Form view (e.g. click on the View Form button) and click on the link "Photo1". The image will be loaded in your default jpg editor (Ability Photopaint would work well).

In the same way, you can link to folders, web sites, word processing files - anything that Windows Explorer can understand can be used in a hyperlink.

For an example database, take a look at HYPERLINKS.ADB (version 4 only).