Post by James A. FortunePost by David W. FentonPost by James A. FortuneI posted some links that contain, among other things, information
about the transition from MDAC as a stand-alone redistributable
http://groups.google.com/group/microsoft.public.access/msg/f2041a0
4 a501df59
Could you please explain exactly what you think the MDAC has to
do with the inclusion of MSJET40.DLL in all versions of Windows
since Windows 2000? The URLs you cited in that post (at least the
ones I looked at) are all old and outdated. I'm not interested in
reading through them to dig out the nuggets, since I assume
you've already done so or wouldn't be citing them. Are there
hints in those articles of the role Jet Red plays in Windows? Or
are they just completely off topic from this thread?
Good question. Maybe MSJET40.DLL is included in Windows so that
multiple threads can use JET replication to handle distributed
processing :-).
Jet Replication has its own set of DLLs, and those are *not*
included by default with Windows. So, no, I don't think that's the
answer.
Post by James A. FortuneAlthough Jet is no longer part of MDAC,
Perhaps precisely because Jet is part of the OS?
Post by James A. FortuneI had a reason
for posting each link. For example, the first link was one of the
few references I found that actually stated what some of the DLL's
are for.
You're right that this thread is not that thread, but keeping the
number of different DLL versions/variants low is one possibility
for including the MSJET40.DLL in the way that they did.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS08-028.mspx
"The Microsoft Jet Database Engine provides data access to
applications such as Microsoft Access, Microsoft Visual Basic, and
many third party applications. Jet can also be used by Internet
applications that require database functionality."
It fails to mention that Windows is using it for something or other,
or it wouldn't be included with Windows even when you don't have any
of those apps installed.
Post by James A. FortuneSo Microsoft says it's there to help applications that need
database functionality. We certainly don't want to hamper
database functionality, but with MSJET40.DLL being so problematic
from a security standpoint, why should Microsoft insist that
everyone have it?
I don't think that's the reason it's installed with Windows at all,
since before Win2K, any app that needed it could install it as
needed. This worked just fine and dandy before Win2K, so I really
can't see how that would be any justification for including it with
Windows, let alone having the Windows development team take over the
maintenance of the Jet 4 db engine's codebase and development.
Post by James A. FortuneSome
sites have the claim that if MSJET40.DLL is deleted, it comes
back.
That's correct, because of file protection in place since Win2K. Any
number of Windows DLLs that you delete will reappear because of this
feature (and it's a good one, in my opinion).
Post by James A. FortuneIs
there data in the registry that requires the OS to use
MSJET40.DLL? Were there lots of things using JET Red, making it
burdensome, or even problematic, to choose JET Red or Blue
exclusively for the OS? I don't really suspect anything sinister
since I've had Access databases that got copied and maintained
separately for other purposes without ever intending for them to
remerged at some point in the future.
I would say that Jet Red would not have been folded into the Windows
team for maintenance and development if it were not used by some
part of Windows such that it *had* to be present. I can see no other
justification for both including it in all copies of Windows *and*
make its maintenance part of the responsibility of the Windows
development team.
--
David W. Fenton http://www.dfenton.com/
usenet at dfenton dot com http://www.dfenton.com/DFA/