MDB Reader

Node Library to read data from Access databases.

Installation

$ npm install mdb-reader

or

$ yarn add mdb-reader

Compatibility

Node / JavaScript

Node >= 10

The library is very likely to work in the browser with buffer for the browser (untested).

Access Database versions

• Access 97 (Jet 3)
• Access 2000, XP and 2003 (Jet 4)
• Access 2010 (ACE14)
• Access 2013 (ACE15)
• Access 2016 (ACE16)

Usage

import { readFileSync } from "fs";
import MDBReader from "mdb-reader";

const buffer = readFileSync("database.mdb");
const reader = new MDBReader(buffer);

reader.getTableNames(); // ['Cats', 'Dogs', 'Cars']

const table = reader.getTable("Cats");
table.getColumnNames(); // ['id', 'name', 'color']
table.getData(); // [{id: 5, name: 'Ashley', color: 'black'}, ...]

API

MDBReader

class MDBReader {
    /**
     * @param buffer Buffer of the database.
     */
    constructor(buffer: Buffer);

    /**
     * Buffer of the database.
     */
    readonly buffer: Buffer;

    getFormat(): "Jet3" | "Jet4";

    /**
     * Returns an array of table names.
     *
     * @param normalTables Includes user tables.
     * @param systemTables Includes system tables.
     * @param linkedTables Includes linked tables.
     */
    getTableNames({
        normalTables,
        systemTables,
        linkedTables,
    }?: {
        normalTables: boolean;
        systemTables: boolean;
        linkedTables: boolean;
    }): string[];

    /**
     * Returns a table by its name.
     *
     * @param name Name of the table. Case sensitive.
     */
    getTable(name: string): Table;
}

Table

class Table {

    /**
     * Name of the table
     */
    readonly name: string,

    /**
     * Number of rows.
     */
    readonly rowCount: number;

    /**
     * Number of columns.
     */
    readonly columnCount: number;

    /**
     * Returns an ordered array of all column definitions.
     */
    getColumns(): Column[];

    /**
     * Returns a column definition by its name.
     *
     * @param name Name of the column. Case sensitive.
     */
    getColumn(name: string): Column;

    /**
     * Returns an ordered array of all column names.
     */
    getColumnNames(): string[];

    /**
     * Returns data from the table.
     *
     * @param columns Columns to be returned. Defaults to all columns.
     * @param rowOffset Index of the first row to be returned. 0-based. Defaults to 0.
     * @param rowLimit Maximum number of rows to be returned. Defaults to Infinity.
     */
    getData<TRow extends {
        [column in TColumn]: number | string | Buffer | Date | boolean | null;
        TColumn extends string = string;
    }>(options?: {
        columns?: ReadonlyArray<TColumn>;
        rowOffset?: number;
        rowLimit?: number;
    }): TRow[];
}

Column

interface Column {
    /**
     * Name of the table
     */
    name: string;

    /**
     * Type of the table
     */
    type:
        | "boolean"
        | "byte"
        | "integer"
        | "long"
        | "currency"
        | "float"
        | "double"
        | "datetime"
        | "binary"
        | "text"
        | "ole"
        | "memo"
        | "repid"
        | "numeric"
        | "complex";
    size: number;

    fixedLength: boolean;
    nullable: boolean;
    autoLong: boolean;
    autoUUID: boolean;

    /**
     * Only exists if type = 'numeric'
     */
    precision?: number;

    /**
     * Only exists if type = 'numeric'
     */
    scale?: number;
}

Data Types

The data types returned by Table.getData() depends on the column type. Null values are always returned as null.

Column Type	JavaScript Type
boolean	boolean
byte	number
integer	number
long	number
currency	string
float	number
double	number
datetime	Date
binary	Buffer
text	string
ole	TBD
memo	string
repid	string
numeric	string
complex	number

Development

Build

To build the library, first install the dependencies, then run yarn build for a single build or yarn watch for automatic rebuilds.

$ yarn install
$ yarn build

Tests

To run the tests, first install the dependencies, then run yarn test. Watch mode can be started with yarn test --watch.

$ yarn install
$ yarn test

Resources

MDB Tool

GitHub

Set of applications to read and write Access files, written in C. Main source of knowledge about the file structure and algorithms to extract data from it.

Jackcess

Jackcess

Java library to read and write Access files. It inspired the interface of this library. The databases used for testing are copied from the repository.

License

MIT