CODEWITHSUNDEEP
excelms-accesslinked-tables
user4734199
user4734199

Reputation:

MS Access Error: "External table not in the expected format" when trying to open linked table which previously worked

I have some queries in my Access database which pull data from Excel files that appear in the database as linked tables. They have worked just fine, until suddenly and inexplicably I was getting the error "External table is not in the expected format," when trying to access them.

I thought it might have to do with the fact that I was using a macro-enabled workbook, but it was fine before. I do have a mail merge set up in Word which is linked to the database, and using one of the aforementioned queries.

Upvotes: 0

Views: 3076

Answers (2)

user3784130
user3784130

Reputation: 71

My form is hooked to a query. The "not in expected format" message happens when the query is set up as a "snapshot". When I changed to "dynaset", the form started to work as expected.

Upvotes: 0

user4734199
user4734199

Reputation:

It turns out that the issue was due to the mail merge document. Once I saved and closed the mail merge file in Word and tried accessing the queries and tables again in Access, the error was no longer appearing.

It seems that if a Word mail merge is connected to the database, this error may appear. I am not sure as to why a more appropriate error is not appearing; after testing it seems to happen regardless of whether the linked file is a macro-enabled workbook or not.

In short, as Olivier put it, the file was locked by Word. A simple issue, but not exactly clear given the error message (unless you follow Andre's logic that the expected format is a non-locked file, hahah).

I hope this helps someone else!

Upvotes: 2

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