how to deal with .mdb access files with python

Question

Can someone point me in the right direction on how to open a .mdb file in python? I normally like including some code to start off a discussion, but I don't know where to start. I work with mysql a fair bit with python. I was wondering if there is a way to work with .mdb files in a similar way?

Answer 1

Below is some code I wrote for another SO question.
It requires the 3rd-party pyodbc module.

This very simple example will connect to a table and export the results to a file.
Feel free to expand upon your question with any more specific needs you might have.

import csv, pyodbc

# set up some constants
MDB = 'c:/path/to/my.mdb'
DRV = '{Microsoft Access Driver (*.mdb)}'
PWD = 'pw'

# connect to db
con = pyodbc.connect('DRIVER={};DBQ={};PWD={}'.format(DRV,MDB,PWD))
cur = con.cursor()

# run a query and get the results 
SQL = 'SELECT * FROM mytable;' # your query goes here
rows = cur.execute(SQL).fetchall()
cur.close()
con.close()

# you could change the mode from 'w' to 'a' (append) for any subsequent queries
with open('mytable.csv', 'w') as fou:
    csv_writer = csv.writer(fou) # default field-delimiter is ","
    csv_writer.writerows(rows)