Discuss "Newbee needs a good book recommendation" in the Microsoft Access forum.

I am somewhat familiar with many aspects of access now but am having trouble pulling them all together. Do you know of perhaps a good textbook where it gives someone assignments to just make a sample database tables queries and forms etc. I think that all my books are exhaustive on the sujects and reference oriented, making them dry and leave little room for experience by actually building a database. Necessary as they may be, I was hoping for a good compliment that would give me exercises and actually build some databases.

I notice you've found the Access Video Tutorials,. I'd suggest you start there.

http://www.developerbarn.com/microso...tutorials.html

Also, a must is clearly understanding database relational principles.

http://www.developerbarn.com/databas...on-basics.html

Lastly, there are many samples,

http://www.developerbarn.com/microso...e-samples.html

Have a mess around with them, look inside the queries and the code behind controls. And espesically the table relationships.

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Have you also checked out the tutorials at

Tutorials From FunctionX

There are a couple of really good in-depth tutorials on Access 2003 and Access 2007 there.

Also,
Access 2007 Inside Out is a good book.

Bob Larson
Access MVP

I was using the 2003 of inside out and out of all of them I liked that the best. By that point I had been through so many others that I skipped around to be true in inside out and I just cant comb through another one of these books. Like I said I was hoping that there might be an exercise book taylored toward just letting the person make one of a few databases. Thanks though for the recommendation.

Microsoft Access 2003 Step By Step was an ok book.... still a little on the dry side....

On a side note; why don't you figure out a couple of databases you would like to build, and we could help you along the way, or at least point you in the right direction.

that sounds like a good idea. Allow me to expound on it a lil. I think we should start a new thread and then you and I can go through steps - this way any subsequent newbee that happens along can reference this. What I am hoping to do is something that will have a many to many relationship. Show that on a form and maybe any common vba stuff that might go along with it. lastly I want to be able to gather info from a child table and update the parent table's info. For right now those are my needs.

As a side, I think there are alot of people who are excel graduates like me. Access takes so much preparation and instruction just to get the whole picture. In excel one can have delivery of the information that they seek almost immediately. Access (though I am getting how this structure is superior) requires many different steps before delivery. and having to learn all those steps has gotten very boring after 400 pages of every little detail.

Lets make a Grocery list database. Items table, Store table, shopping centers. This could get a lil complicated because one item could be bought in many kinds of stores and then if the store is a chain it can be bought in many different shopping centers. So when you leave the office one can decide to leave in a different direction, query the database and since they will be in a particular shopping center that may have other things then one can multitask. Good idea? Too complicated?

Let me know what you think?

Well, I'm all for helping out..... the first thing you need to do, is figure out what kind of data is going to be collected, and how you want that data manipulated. I call this the pen and paper stage. If you're going to make a complicated db, it's best to put it all down on paper first. Making sure that you're not missing anything

Ok and Ill just start it in a new post thanks.

I look forward to helping On a side note, MS Access, while very versatile, can actually be limiting. If it could all be done by a database then there would be no need for Excel, but in the same breath, you can get Access to do almost anything you want it to. With that said, sometimes, Access isn't the best tool for the job. Just so you understand, Access is designed to store data in a one by one method; whereas Excel stores whole datasets as a record. A spreadsheet can have hundreds of records stored under the same header, while a database has one record stored under a header. Excel makes it easy to manipulate whole columns while a database primarily limits you to manipulating row data. This is the primary misconception of people converting from Excel to Access.

Sure, there are basic functions involving columns in Access, but to manipulate a whole column of data in Access, other than the basic functions, requires a little bit of finesse, and often goes against normalization rules for databases. As long as you look at Access as a one by one record type manipulation, then you will be ok, when you start looking at manipulating whole datasets for Access, you will run into problems.

To say it simply.... Access, record by record...... Excel, groups of data, by groups of data. Access - one value....Excel - many values.

A simple 2+2=4 problem.....
Access - Table Values - Field1 -2, Field2 - 2
Access - Query Values - Field1, Field2, Expr1: [field1]+[field2]

Excel - A1 = 2, A2 =2, A3=A1+A2

Access - 2 steps to get the calculated value
Excel - 1 step to get the calculated value

In the table view of Access, you can't make field3 equal the sum of field1 and field2. Sure, you can do it with an append query or through vba or form functions, but it's not as easy as the Excel method. This is one of the reasons why you should never store calculated values in a table....... yes, there are exceptions, but as a designer, you have to work around those exceptions as well. In Excel, A3 will always update correctly, but in Access, the calculated value is only updated upon running the query or form equation/vba.

In Excel, if you change A1 and A2 to 3, then it automatically updates, with Access, if you change field1 and field2 to 3, then you have to run the query or form function to do it....this isn't very helpful if you have queries that bypass this function, or forms that don't include this function.