Datasheet

Part I: Basic Training

Good news: Access 2010 will open database files you created with previ-

ous versions of Access, and should support whatever features are

employed within those database files. All your tables should open prop-

erly, 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. Access opens for you right then and

there.

Does having an Access icon on the Quick Launch portion of the Taskbar sound

extremely convenient? It is! To add the icon, follow these steps:

1. Choose Start➪All Programs➪Microsoft Office.

2. When the list of Office applications appears, hold down the Ctrl key

and click and drag the Access menu command down to the Quick

Launch bar (that’s the portion of the Taskbar immediately to the right

of the Start button).

A black I-beam cursor, along with an icon for the application and a plus

sign (indicating that the shortcut will be a duplicate of the command on

the menu), appears where you point with your mouse on the bar, indi-

cating where the new icon will go.

3. Release the mouse button and then release the Ctrl key.

You’ve got yourself single-click access to, well, Access.

Don’t have a Quick Launch bar on your Taskbar? Right-click the Taskbar and

choose Toolbars from the pop-up menu. From the resulting submenu, choose

Quick Launch. It won’t have a check next to it if it’s not currently part of your

Taskbar — if it’s already checked, you do have a Quick Launch bar displayed

and just didn’t realize it. If it’s not checked, choose it, and you’ll have a place

to put the icons you want to keep handy.

If you’re using Windows 7, you can also right-click on any icon in the Programs

menu and choose Pin to Taskbar from the pop-up menu. Quick and easy!

Selecting a starting point

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

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