Chapter 1
In This Chapter
Deciding when to use Access
Discovering what’s new in Access 2016
Unlocking the basics of working with Access
Figuring out how to get started
Access 2016, the most recent version of the Microsoft Office database application, continues to be a very powerful program. You probably already know that, and perhaps that power is what made you choose Access for managing your data and to also reach for this book. Great decisions so far!
For all of its power, Access is pretty friendly to new users. In fact, with just the basic functionality that you’ll discover in this book, you’ll be able to put Access through many of its most important paces, yet you’ll be working with wizards and other onscreen tools that keep you at a comfortable arm’s distance from the software’s inner workings, the things that programmers and serious developers play with. There. Don’t you feel better now?
In this chapter, you’ll discover what Access does best (and when you might want to use another tool instead), and you’ll get a look at what’s new and improved in Access 2016 (compared to Access 2013). You’ll see how it does what it does, and hopefully you’ll begin to understand and absorb some basic terminology.
Now, don’t panic; nobody’s expecting you to memorize tons of complex vocabulary or anything scary like that. The goal here (and in the next two chapters) with regard to terms is to introduce you to some basic words and general concepts intended to help you make better use of Access — as well as better understand later chapters in this book, if you choose to follow us all the way to its stunning, life-altering conclusion.
What is Access good for? That’s a good question. Well, the list of what you can do with it is a lot longer than the list of what you can’t do with it — of course, especially if you leave things like “wash your car” and “put away the dishes” off the “can’t do” list. When it comes to data organization, storage, and retrieval, Access is at the head of the class.
Okay, what do I mean by big database? Any database with a lot of records — and by a lot, I mean hundreds. At least. And certainly if you have thousands of records, you need a tool like Access to manage them. Although you can use Microsoft Excel to store lists of records, it limits how many you can store (no more than the number of rows in a single worksheet). In addition, you can’t use Excel to set up anything beyond a simple list that can be sorted and filtered. So anything with a lot of records and complex data is best done in Access.
Some reasons why Access handles big databases well are
There are several ways to build apps — a term that’s come to mean an application that runs on a smartphone or tablet — but that also applies to SharePoint, with Access 2016.
You can build an app using the Access 2016 Web App template or build a custom web app, starting from scratch. You can download an app from the Office Store and then customize it. You can also build a standard database, just like you always have in Access, and publish that via the web.
Now, that said, this is not a book about apps or building them. The goal of this book is to show you how to use Access to build databases for use on a computer (a desktop or laptop/notebook). If you need to create a database app for use on a smartphone or tablet, you can take a look at Dummies.com
or check out iOS 6 Application Development For Dummies, published by Wiley, or explore instructions available online by Googling How do I create a database app with Access 2016.
Whether your database holds 100 records or 100,000 records (or more), if you need to keep separate tables and relate them for maximum use of the information, you need a relational database — and that’s Access. How do you know whether your data needs to be in separate tables? Think about your data — is it very compartmentalized? Does it go off on tangents? Consider the following example and apply the concepts to your data and see if you need multiple tables for your database.
Imagine you work for a very large company, and the company has data pertaining to their customers and their orders, the products the company sells, its suppliers, and its employees. For a complex database like this one, you need multiple tables, as follows:
Other tables exist, too — to keep a list of shipping companies and their contact information (for shipping customer orders), an expense table (for the expenses incurred in running the business), and other tables that are used with the main four tables. The need for and ways to use the main tables and these additional tables are covered later in this book, as you find out how to set up tools for data entry, look up records, and create reports that provide varying levels of detail on all the data you’ve stored.
If you think carefully about your database, how you use your data, and what you need to know about your employees, customers, volunteers, donors, products, or projects — whatever you’re storing information about — you can plan
Of course, everyone forgets something, and plans change after a system has already been implemented. But don’t worry — Access isn’t so rigid that chaos will ensue if you begin building your tables and forget something (a field or two, an entire table). You can always add a field that you forgot (or that some bright spark just told you is needed) or add a new table after the fact. But planning ahead as thoroughly as possible is still essential.
Here’s a handy procedure to follow if you’re new to the process of planning a database:
Now, based on that information, create a new list of the actual details you could store:
List every piece of information you can possibly think of about your customers, products, ideas, cases, books, works of art, students — whatever your database pertains to. Don’t be afraid to go overboard — you can always skip some of the items in the list if they don’t turn out to be things you really need to know (or can possibly find out) about each item in your database.
Take the list of fields — that’s what all those pieces of information are — and start breaking them up into logical groups.
How? Think about the fields and how they work together:
With a big list of fields and some tentative groupings of those fields at the ready, and with an idea of which field is unique for each record, you can begin figuring out how to use the data.
With this planning done, you’re ready to start building your database. The particulars of that process come later in this chapter and in subsequent chapters, so don’t jump in yet. Do pat yourself on the back, though, because if you’ve read this procedure and applied even some of it to your potential database, you’re way ahead of the game, and we’re confident you’ll make good use of all that Access has to offer.
When you’re planning your database, consider how the data will be entered:
If you’ll be doing the data entry yourself, perhaps you’re comfortable working in a spreadsheet-like environment (known in Access as Datasheet view), where the table is a big grid. You fill it in row by row, and each row is a record.
Figure 1-1 shows a table of volunteers in progress in Datasheet view. You decide: Is it easy to use, or can you picture yourself forgetting to move down a row and entering the wrong stuff in the wrong columns as you enter each record? As you can see, there are more fields than show in the window, so you’d be doing a lot of scrolling to the left and right to use this view.
The mind-numbing effect (and inherent increased margin for error) is especially likely when you have lots of fields in a database, and the user, if working in Datasheet view, has to move horizontally through the fields. A form like the one in Figure 1-2 puts the fields in a more pleasing format, making it easier to enter data into the fields and to see all the fields simultaneously (or only those you want data entered into).
You find out all about forms in Chapter 8. If your database is large enough that you require help doing the data entry, or if it’s going to grow over time, making an ongoing data-entry process likely, Access is the tool for you. The fact that it offers simple forms of data entry/editing is reason enough to make it your database application of choice.
Yet another reason to use Access is the ability it gives you to create customized reports quickly and easily. Some database programs, especially those designed for single-table databases (known as flat-file databases), have some canned reports built in, and that’s all you can do — just select a report from the list and run the same report that every other user of that software runs.
If you’re an Excel user, your reporting capabilities are far from easy or simple, and they’re not designed for use with large databases — they’re meant for spreadsheets and small, one-table lists. Furthermore, you have to dig much deeper into Excel’s tools to get at these reports. Access, on the other hand, is a database application, so reporting is a major, up-front feature.
An example? In Excel, to get a report that groups your data by one or more of the fields in your list, you have to sort the rows in the worksheet first, using the field(s) to sort the data, and then you can create what’s known as a subtotal report. To create it, you use a dialog box that asks you about calculations you want to perform, where to place the results, and whether you’re basing a sort and/or a subtotal on more than one field. The resulting report is not designed for printing, and you have to tinker with your spreadsheet pagination (through a specialized view of the spreadsheet) to control how the report prints out.
In Access? Just fire up the Report Wizard, and you can sort your data, choose how to group it, decide which pieces of data to include in the report, and pick a visual layout and color scheme, all in one simple, streamlined process. Without you doing anything, the report is ready for printing. Access is built for reporting — after all, it is a database application — and reports are one of the most (if not the most) important ways you’ll use and share your data.
Because reports are such an important part of Access, you can not only create them with minimum fuss but also customize them to create powerful documentation of your most important data:
So, you can create any kind of custom report in Access, using any or all of your database tables and any of the fields from those tables, and you can group fields and place them in any order you want:
If all this sounds exciting, or at least interesting, then you’re really on the right track with Access. The need to create custom reports is a major reason to use Access; you can find out about all these reporting options in Chapters 18 through 21. That’s right: This chapter plus three more — that’s four whole chapters — are devoted to reporting. It must be a big feature in Access!
For users of Access 2007, 2010, or 2013, the upgrade to 2016 won’t seem like a big deal, other than the changes to the fonts used on the ribbons, the change to a white background for the ribbons, database tabs, and the All Access Objects panel on the left side of the workspace — but these are purely cosmetic changes.
If you’re coming from 2003, the biggest changes are found in the interface. Gone are the familiar menus and toolbars of 2003 and prior versions, now replaced by a ribbon bar divided into tabs that take you to different versions of those old standbys. It’s a big change, and it takes some getting used to.
In this book, however, we’re going to assume you already got your feet wet with 2007, 2010, or 2013 and aren’t thrown by the interface anymore. We’re figuring you upgraded to 2010 or 2013 or have played with one or both of them enough to feel comfortable diving into 2016.
What the heck is SharePoint? Even if your company isn’t using it yet, you’ve no doubt been seeing the product name and hearing how it provides the ability to see and use your Access data from anywhere — using desktop applications, a web browser, or even your phone. And in truth, it’s Microsoft’s software product that does all that and more, helping you manage your documents and collaborate with coworkers via the company network. Simply click the Save Database As command in the File tab’s panel (see Figure 1-6), and you’re on your way to publishing your database to SharePoint, which means you can access it from pretty much everywhere, including that beach in Maui. Of course, if you or your company don’t have a SharePoint server, you won’t be able to make use of this, and you don’t need to concern yourself with this section.
As shown in Figure 1-6, the Save As options include regular old Save Database As, to save your existing database with a new name or in some format other than as an Access database; and Save Object As, to save a table, form, query, or report with a new name. You can also choose from several Advanced options to save the database as a package (to distribute your Access applications) or as an executable file (a single file that when run by the recipient, opens a database application), to back up the database, and to use the aforementioned SharePoint.
When you look at all the applications in Microsoft Office — Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and of course, Access — you’ll see some features that are consistent throughout the suite. There are big differences, too, and that’s where books like this one come in handy, helping you deal with what’s different and not terribly obvious to a new user.
Access has several features in common with the rest of the applications in the Microsoft Office suite. You’ll find the same buttons on several of the tabs, and the Quick Access Toolbar (demonstrated in Chapter 2) appears in all the applications.
To make sure you’re totally Access-ready, here’s a look at the basic procedures that can give you a solid foundation on which to build.
Access opens in any one of several ways. So, like a restaurant with a very comprehensive menu, some people will love all the choices, and others will say, “I can’t decide! There are just too many options to choose from!”
Now, you’ll run into situations in which one of the ways is the glaringly best choice — hands down, and that one will be the way to go. But what if you’ve never heard of it? You’ll be trying to find my phone number (I’m unlisted — ha!) so you can give me a piece of your mind. So to acquaint you with all your choices (so you’ll be ready for any situation), here are all the ways you can open Access:
Windows 8.1 users can utilize any of several methods to start an application — click the lower left corner of the screen to display the Start icon, press the Windows key on the keyboard, or if you have a touchscreen, tap the Start button. Once the Start screen appears, tap the Access application tile.
If you’ve recently used Access, you’ll see it in the list on the left side of the Start menu. Just choose Start ⇒ Microsoft Access 2016, and Access opens.
Double-click any existing Access database file on your Desktop or in a folder (as shown in Figure 1-7). Access opens automatically.
Good news: Access 2016 will open database files you created with previous versions of Access, and should support whatever features are employed within those database files. All your tables should open properly, and reports, forms, and queries should all work fine, too.
So Access is open, and (assuming you opened it from the Start menu or from the Quick Launch portion of the Taskbar) you’re staring at the Access interface. You may see features whose purposes elude you or that you don’t yet know how to use. Hey, don’t worry; that’s why you’re reading this book!
You can find out more about all the tabs and buttons, panels and menus, and all that fun stuff in Chapter 2. For now, just look at the ways Access offers you to get started with your database, be it an existing one that needs work or a new one you have all planned out and ready to go.
Well, this is the easy one. If a database already exists, you can open it by clicking the File tab (at the upper left of the workspace) and choosing Open from the list of commands that appears. As shown in Figure 1-8, a panel opens, displaying the types of files you can open (just to the right of the long red File panel) and the databases you’ve most recently used. Click the word Recent in the list to the near left and then click the database in the Recent list, and it opens, listing its current tables, queries, reports, and forms on the far left side of the window.
When the database opens, you can open and view its various parts just by double-clicking them in that leftmost panel; whatever you open appears in the main, central part of the window. Figure 1-9 shows an example: a table, ready for editing.
After you open a table, you can begin entering or editing records. You can read more about how that’s done in Chapter 6, which demonstrates the different ways to edit your data and tweak your tables’ setups. If you want to tinker with any existing queries, you can open these, too, just by clicking them in the list on the left side of the workspace. (For more information on queries, check out Chapters 12 and 13. You can do simple sorting and look for particular records with the skills you pick up in Chapters 10 and 12.)
So you don’t have a database to open, eh? Well, don’t let that stop you. To start a new one, all you have to do is open Access, using any of the techniques listed earlier in this chapter (except the one that starts Access by opening an existing database file, which you don’t have yet).
After Access is open, click the New command in the File tab (if that’s not already the active command). From the resulting display, you can click the Blank Desktop Database button (shown in Figure 1-10) to get started.
Next, give your database a name (see the dialog box that appears in Figure 1-12), and click the Create button.
If this is your absolute first database in a fresh installation of Access, the filename offered in this panel will be Database1
. Note that you don’t need to type a file extension here; Access will add the correct one for you.
At this point, with your new database open, you can begin entering records into your first table or begin naming your fields and setting them up. The field names go in the topmost row (the ID
field is already created, by default in the new table), and the label Click to Add
is atop the column with the active cell. If you choose to save your table now (right-click the Table1 tab and choose Save), you can name your table something more useful than Table1
.
Access provides templates (prepared files that work sort of like database cookie cutters) for your new database needs. You’ll find a set of template icons in the same New panel where we just chose a Blank Desktop Database. As shown in Figure 1-12, you can choose a template category by clicking any of the words under the Search for Online Templates search box, and search online for templates in that category.
Once the online search is complete (assuming you’re online at the time), a series of big buttons, one for each template found that matches your search, appears. Note that a larger list of categories — to be used if you want to search again for another category of templates — appears on the right.
So you’ve got a new database started. What do you do now? You can leaf on over to Chapter 2, where you can find out more about all the tools that Access offers — which tools are onscreen almost all the time and which ones are specific to the way you chose to dig in and start that database.
In Chapter 3, you actually begin building a database, setting up tables and the fields that give them structure. And you figure out which tables you need to set up, putting that great plan you built in this chapter to work!