Microsoft AccessControlling your data - with MS Access
Access is the relational database within the Office Professional suite. For many people Access is the least known and most baffling of the programs included with Office!
Using Access we can design and create a database for you and we can teach you and your staff how to create their own databases, queries and reports.
Why would you use Access rather than Excel?
Excel is often used as a database, a list of structured information which you use to create reports and documents such as mailing lists, invoices, Management Information etc.
It is relatively simple to create a list in Excel and update it when things change.
Where you start to run into difficulties is when you need to change the same piece of information in 5 different places and the “Excel database” is hundreds of lines long, about 50 columns wide, and you have a sheet for each month of the year! Nightmare!
Excel, used in this way, is a “Flat file” database. There are no enforced links between the many columns and lines of data. If you have 5 places where your piece of information is used, you will probably need to change it in 5 places if it changes. There is often no easy way to keep a track of what was changed and when. Keeping it all in sync can become a real trauma!
This is where Access Rules!
Access allows you to store many related pieces of information in a simple format where one change ensures that everything is kept up to date. Setting it up takes a little more thought than creating a list in Excel, but the benefits are huge. If you use a piece of information in 100 different places it will still only be stored once, so, updating it becomes a simpler task. And if, heaven forbid, the data is wrong – it will always be wrong and is much easier to spot and rectify!
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