Chapter 1 AL Getting to Know Access 2010 ▶ Discovering what’s new in Access 2010 ▶ Unlocking the basics of working with Access MA ▶ Figuring out how to get started TE ▶ Deciding when to use Access RI In This Chapter A GH TE D ccess 2010, the most recent version of the Microsoft Office database application, is a very robust and powerful program. You probably already know that, and perhaps that power — or your perceptions of all that Access can do — is what made you reach for this book.
12 Part I: Basic Training of high-tech 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 concepts to help you make better use of Access in general — as well as better understand later chapters in this book, if you choose to follow us all the way to its stunning conclusion. What Is Access Good For, Anyway? What is Access good for? That’s a good question.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 ✓ Big databases are hard to wade through when you want to find something. Access provides several tools for sorting, searching, and creating your own specialized tools (known as queries) for finding the elusive single record or group of records you need.
14 Part I: Basic Training ✓ A third table, again containing the volunteer number, would include the volunteer’s preferences for activities — things they’re good at, enjoy doing, and special skills or resources they can offer, such as training homeless dogs or providing space in a barn for rescued horses.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 2. 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. 3.
16 Part I: Basic Training Databases with user forms 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 Table 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 in progress in Table view.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 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 Table view, has to move horizontally through the fields. A form like the one in Figure 1-2 puts the fields in a more digestible, vertical format, making it easier to enter data into the fields and to see all the fields at once (or only those you want data entered into).
18 Part I: Basic Training Databases that require special reporting Yet another reason to use Access is its ability 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.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 Figure 1-3: Ah, simplicity. A quick report is just one click away. Figure 1-4: The Report Wizard creates more elaborate (but simple) reports, like this one.
20 Part I: Basic Training ✓ You can really roll up your sleeves and design a new report — or play with an existing one, adding all sorts of bells and whistles. Figure 1-5 shows this happening in Design view — note that the report’s title (“Volunteers Report”) is selected: It has a box around it and tiny handles on the corners and sides of the box, which means you can reformat the title, change the font, size, or color of the text, or even edit the words themselves if a new title is needed.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 ✓ If you want to place your personal stamp on every aspect of your report, you can use Design view to • Add titles, instructional or descriptive text boxes, and graphics. • Set up customized headers and footers to include any information you want to appear on all the report’s pages. If all this sounds exciting, or at least interesting, then you’re really on the right track with Access.
22 Part I: Basic Training Figure 1-6: Backstage view — new but hauntingly familiar to those who remember the File menu. ✓ Speaking of that ribbon bar that’s new to Access 2003 users, the Ribbon — as Microsoft likes to refer to it — is now much more customizable. Using the Options menu, available through Backstage view, you can create new tabs, and customize existing ones by adding and reorganizing buttons on the associated Ribbon groups. (More about this feature in this very chapter — Chapter 1.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 Figure 1-7: Pick a template from any category offered with Office online templates to speed up your databasebuilding process. ✓ Publishing to the Web is even easier, including the reports you’ve created, your forms, and your data itself. The whole shooting match can be opened in a browser window once you publish and upload it to the Web. Look in Chapter 10 for more information on how this works.
24 Part I: Basic Training you start the application, however, you won’t encounter most of them until and unless you want to. So for the new user, and for the early stages of your database development, you’ve still got the same solid and dependable tools Access always offered for building tables, setting up reports and forms, and creating the relationships between your tables that make the database everything you need it to be.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 As shown in Figure 1-8, the Save and Publish options include regular old Save Database As (to save it in some other format other than as an Access database), Save Object As (to save your database as a PDF or XPS file), and there’s one more under the Publish heading: You can choose to Publish to Access Services.
26 Part I: Basic Training How Access Works and How You Work with It 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 these come in handy, helping you deal with what’s different and/or not terribly obvious to a new user.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 ✓ Double-click any existing Access database file on your Desktop or in a folder (as shown in Figure 1-11). Access opens automatically. Figure 1-10: The Windows Start menu offers all the Microsoft Office applications in one submenu. Figure 1-11: Double-click an Access database file, and Access opens right up.
28 Part I: Basic Training Good news: Access 2010 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. ✓ If some helpful person has added Access to the Quick Launch toolbar (on the Windows Taskbar), you can click the Access 2010 icon (it looks like a pink key) and there you go.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 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. Opening an existing database Well, this is the easy one. If a database already exists, you can open it by clicking the Office button (at the upper left of the workspace) and choosing Recent from the list of commands that appears. As shown in Figure 1-12, a panel opens, displaying the databases you’ve most recently used.
30 Part I: Basic Training Figure 1-13: An existing table, ready for records. A database file holds all your database components. Everything associated with the data is part of the database, including ✓ All the tables that house your data ✓ Queries that help you search and use the data ✓ Reports that show what your data is and what it means ✓ Forms that allow people to view, enter, and edit data After Access is open, you can click the Blank Database button (shown in Figure 1-14) to get started.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 A panel appears on the right side of the Access window, asking you for a name for your new database. (See Figure 1-14.) Blank Database button Figure 1-14: The far-right panel lets you name and choose a home for your database. Blank Database options 2. Replace the default DatabaseX with whatever name you want to use.
32 Part I: Basic Training b. Use the panel on the left side of the File New Database dialog box to navigate to a folder for your database. When you’re looking at a list of folders, click once to select the one in which you want to store your database. c. As needed, click the New Folder button and name your new folder — click OK to return to the File New Database dialog box. d. Click OK — the name you gave the file back in Step 2 is applied, and the file is saved to the location you chose.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 shown in Figure 1-16, you can choose a template category by clicking any of the icons (which changes the displayed icons in the center of the workspace). Click a template icon, and you see its details displayed on the right — along with the File Name box you saw when starting a new Blank Database.
34 Part I: Basic Training After you’ve downloaded the template (or chosen a template that was available in your installed copy of Access), you can start building data into it.
Chapter 1: Getting to Know Access 2010 Now what? So you’ve got a new database started. What do you do now? You leaf on over to Chapter 2, where you can find out more about all the tools that Access offers — which tools are on-screen 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.
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