Tag Archive for 'Microsoft Access'

Access vs Excel: How To Choose The Right One For You

Published
by
M Jacks
on October 5, 2022
in Microsoft Access, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Office Articles and Other Articles
. 0 Comments

Data is a major part of life, but how do we manage it? Most use Excel, some use Access. Both have their similarities. So Access vs Excel, which should we choose?

Microsoft Access vs Microsoft Excel

Contents

To jump right in, both programs can store large amounts of data, run powerful queries and perform sophisticated calculations to return the desired results.

To put things extremely simply, you use Excel for data analysis and Access for data management.

Still, if we want to know which piece of software, specifically, might be helpful for our particular needs, it’s useful to look at the benefits of both programmes.

(Note: All Microsoft Office suites include Excel, but not all suites include Access.)

1. Access vs Excel: Advantages

1.1 Advantages of Excel

Excel is a spreadsheet programme and one of the most used applications in the world, with many benefits of use:

1. Easy to Learn: Excel takes relatively little time and effort to learn. Although Excel has many advanced functions that take longer to master, you can quickly pick up the fundamentals.

2. Data Visualisation Capabilities: Excel has an incredible number of options for visualising data, including PivotTables, graphs and charts, which you can customise however you wish. 

3. Formulas and Functions: Excel formulas can do almost anything, from simple numeric calculations to very complex analyses.

4. Flexibility: Although designed for Data analysis, Excel can be (and has been) used for almost any task

(Follow this link for our beginner’s guide to Excel)

1.2 Advantages of Access:

Access is a Microsoft database management system (DBMS) used for both small and large databases.

1. Relational Database: Access allows you to relate data in one table to data in different tables. Information can be stored in one table and referenced in another.

(NB: It is also possible to have a relational database model in Excel, but this involves using Excel’s more advanced functionality.)

2. Reporting Capabilities: Access has possibly the best report-generating capabilities of any of the members of the Microsoft Office suite.

3. Storage Capacity: Access is built to handle enormous amounts of data as a database system. It can also differentiate between different types of data.

4. Data Validation: Access allows you to check or validate data in your databases as you enter it by using validation rules.

To decide if Access or Excel is best for your needs, you can consider the following questions:

5. Flat versus relational data: Is your data relational? Data contained in a single table or worksheet is called flat or nonrelational data. In a relational database, you organise your information into multiple tables.

6. Local versus external data: You can use Access to connect to data from various external data sources to view, query, and edit that data without having to import it. You can also use Excel to connect to multiple data sources (including Access), but you cannot edit the source data through the Excel user interface.

7. Data integrity versus flexibility: Access requires unique identifiers within any Table, which help preserve the integrity of your data and which are used to relate records in one table to records in another. Excel lets you enter data more freely, although it is possible to control data entry using the Data Validation command.

8. Multi-user collaboration: Access lets multiple users open a single database simultaneously because it locks only the data that another user is editing. In Excel, you can share a workbook with other users, but collaboration works best when users work on data at different times, not simultaneously.

You can also ask which data analysis tools would best suit your purpose:

9. Querying: Access allows the creation of complex queries to view your data in various ways, retrieving only the rows and columns of data you want, whether the data is contained in one or many tables.

10. Modelling? Excel has what-if analysis tools that allow you to run different scenarios on your data, such as best-case and worst-case scenarios. No similar feature is available in Access.

11. Pivoting and charting? Excel provides PivotTable reporting and advanced charting features. Although Access can produce pivoted (Crosstab) reports and has some charts available, they are not as sophisticated as those in Excel.

(Follow this link for our beginner’s guide to Access)

2. Access vs Excel: When to Use Them

2.1 When to use Excel

Excel is incredibly flexible and can store data like Access, but is optimised for data analysis and calculation. Use Excel when you:

  • Only need a flat or nonrelational view of your data.
  • Run calculations and statistical analysis.
  • Want to use PivotTable reports.
  • Create charts regularly.
  • Want options to emphasise your data, like conditional formatting icons, data bars, and colour scales.

2.2 When to use Access

Very generally, Access is the best choice when you track and record data regularly, and need to export or produce reports for subsets of that data. Use Access when you:

  • Have multiple users.
  • Will be adding more tables to a data set.
  • Want to run complex queries.
  • Want the ability to produce complex reports.

3. Using Access and Excel together

Of course, it is not necessarily an either/or choice. There may be times when it makes sense to take advantage of both programs’ benefits. It does not matter which program you have used first. There are built-in tools to bring data into Access from Excel (and vice versa) by copying, importing, or exporting it.

If you use Access to store your data and Excel to analyse it, you can benefit from both of these excellent pieces of software.

If you would like to learn more about either software, we provide certified training courses tailored to you and your requirements. Get in touch with us today for a free, no-obligation consultation.

info@inferotraining.com
0115 9586699
Barker Gate
Nottingham, NG1 1JU

Microsoft Access: Introducing You to the Database(ics)

Published
by
Ruth Brown
on September 27, 2022
in Microsoft Access, Microsoft Office Articles and Other Articles
. 0 Comments

Microsoft Access arguably doesn’t share the same fame as other Microsoft products. However, it still packs a punch. Read on to find out what it can do.

Microsoft Access

Data, data, data. It’s what most businesses boil down to; it holds the secrets to success, but if improperly managed, it is the cause of problems. It needs to be stored effectively and efficiently to keep this rich source of insight and strategy working in your favour.

The solution? Databases.

This leads us to today’s menu of discussion as one of the first mass-market database programs for Windows, Microsoft Access.

What is Microsoft Access:

Microsoft Acess is a data management system (DBMS) produced by Microsoft and part of the Microsoft 365 Office Suite.

It uses a graphic user interface (GUI) and software development tools. It’s suitable for people with and without coding experience and is used to store, manage and visualise large quantities of data.

Microsoft Access is an excellent database software solution for individuals and small to medium businesses. 

Applications of Microsoft Access:

  • Creating forms for data entry 
  • Importing data from other databases (such as Excel)
  • Creating reports that you can save in a PDF format for printing and sharing
  • Designing forms for data entry and viewing

Components of Microsoft Access:

Tables

The backbone of all databases is the tables, which hold the data and information. Like Excel, you can build tables of rows and columns, each with a field name and the rows representing a record.

Creating all the necessary subject-based tables for the data required is the first step of creating a database in Microsoft Access.

Queries

In Microsoft Acess, you can use queries to apply conditions that will sort, search, and filter the data into relevant views, so specific information in the database is easier and quicker to find.

You can also use Queries to calculate, summarise and combine data, and create automations with no code.

The database query language is SQL (Structured Query Language). However, you only need to learn SQL if you wish to be an advanced Microsoft Access user.

Relationships

You use Relationships to create a connection between different tables with related fields. The result of building a Relationship between tables is one table with common fields that have their relationships with other tables defined.

Relationships are essential when creating Microsoft Access databases. They reduce redundancies and repeating data.

Forms

Forms are a fundamental Microsoft Access component as it controls how the user interacts with and operates the database. For example, people can enter, edit and display data using them.

You can also design and revise forms to reflect their purpose.

Reports

Reports are a way to format, summarise and show the results and information given by the database. Once you have created the report, Microsoft Access saves it in an uneditable format, such as a PDF.

Macros

Microsoft Access Macros allow the database to carry out actions automatically. It is essentially a simplified version of coding where, instead, you select a list of actions from a drop-down list to create the automation.

The order of actions given in your list will be the order in which the automation performs the steps and doesn’t require code in a Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) module.

Modules

Modules are where user-defined actions, functions and global variables created using VBA are written, stored and accessed in Microsoft Access.

VBA is more powerful and versatile than Macros, but it is more complex to add functionality to the database and is usually the choice of advanced Microsoft Access users.

Interested in improving your Microsoft Macros mastery by learning how to use VBA? Click here to find out more about our extremely popular VBA course.

If you want to learn more about Microsoft Acces, check out some of our Tips and Tricks here!

Your needs are at the heart of our enterprise. We look forward to hearing what your training requirements are and how we can help you or your company reach your goals every step of the way.

info@inferotraining.com
0115 9586699
Barker Gate
Nottingham
NG1 1JU

Microsoft Access Tip: Creating Relationships

Published
by
Emilie Musson
on February 2, 2016
in Microsoft Access Tips
. 0 Comments

A great tool in Access is Relationship; which is used to combine information between two or more tables. You need more than one table to do this. So the first step would be to create two or more tables relative to your database.

 

To start, you need to Select the Database Tools tab in the Ribbon, in the Relationships command group and click Relationships.

 

 

 

 

If you haven’t yet defined any relationships between your tables, the Show Table dialog box will appear automatically. To find Show Table dialog box however, all you have to do is click on the Design contextual tab, in the Relationships group click Show Table.

 

 

 

Once the Show Table dialog box appears, it will display all of the tables and queries in the database. To see only tables, click Tables tab.

 

 

 

Select one or more tables, and then click Add. For this example, we are looking at creating a relationship between Customers and Employees tables. Click Close when you are done.

 

 

 

 

Drag a field (typically the primary key) from one table to the common field (the foreign key) in the other table. You can drag multiple fields by pressing the Ctrl key on your keyboard and click each field you want, and then drag them. You can do this between Multiple Tables to any field required.

 

Dragging from one field to the other is the easiest way of creating instant relationships.

 

 

 

The Edit Relationships dialog box appears.

 

 

Verify that the field names shown are the common fields for the relationship. If you want to edit it or if a field name is incorrect or you have changed your mind, simply click on the field name and select the appropriate field from the list.

 

To enforce referential integrity for this relationship, select the Enforce Referential Integrity box. Note that Relationship Type appears at the bottom. Click Create New button to create more relationship and add the details in the Create New dialog box

 

 

And if can set the Join Type by click the relevant button:

 

 

 

When you are finished in the Relationships window, click Save to save your relationship layout changes.

 

We hope that you found this tip insightful and helpful, if you would like any more access tip’s, check out our others.

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Microsoft Access Tips: Validation Rule

Published
by
Simpson
on April 27, 2015
in Microsoft Access Tips and Tips and Tricks
. 3 Comments

Access is designed for users to enter data into a database easily but sometimes people type in the wrong data and this can affect the tables and final reports.In this blog post we will be looking how to create a Validation Rule in Access 2007, 2010, and 2013.

 

To stop this you are able to implement Validation Rules to stop this from happening. The Validation Rule limits the values that can be entered into a field. So for example you are able to stop a number greater than 100 being entered in.

 

You can put a validation rule on any field in a table and this is found on the design view of that table, under the general tab.

 

Validation Rule 1

 

You can see there are 2 fields for Validation, Rule and Text. The rule is where you put in your “Rule” here are some examples below:

 


Rule Explanation
>30 Only numbers greater than 30
<20 Only numbers less than 20
Between 20 and 30 Numbers between 20 and 30

 

 

Validation text is where you put the text for the message box that will appear if the rule has been broken. This can be any message and you will always get a OK, Cancel Message box that will appear.

 

Validation Rule 2

Microsoft Access Tips: Adding Custom Shortcut Keys

Published
by
Shaun
on September 24, 2014
in Microsoft Access Tips and Tips and Tricks
. 0 Comments

Welcome to another Microsoft Access Tip. As we have discussed in previous articles, shortcut keys are a great way of saving time whilst working with different programs. In this tip, we will explain how you can add your own shortcuts to use to navigate your database

 

To assign a shortcut key to a field, follow these simple steps:

 

  • Edit the caption property of the label of the particular control you want to jump to, adding an ‘&‘ before the letter you want to act as the shortcut key.

 

For example, if you wish to be able to jump to a ‘Name’ field you could edit the ‘Name’ label accordingly: N&ame

 

  • In Form View the label will be displayed with the ‘a’ in name underlined: Name
  • Pressing ALT + A will switch the focus to the ‘Name’ field.

 

This technique can be used on any object that has a caption property and can make navigating your database a breeze.

 

If you would like to read about some of the keyboard shortcuts already available on Microsoft Access, take a look at our previous article: Speed up Access with Keyboard Shortcuts.

 

If you would like to read more tips, feel free to read our Microsoft Access Tip page.

 

If you would like to learn more about Microsoft Access, you should book yourself on one of our Microsoft Access Training Courses.