A really good wee video about Access. I've been using it for almost a quarter of a century! I was a COBOL programmer back then (as we were known at the time - developer being the preferred term nowadays). I was then seconded into a team that was not under the IT umbrella for a couple of days a week to write extracts of data from our Data General Mini-Computer (a small scale mainframe) and our larger ICL Mainframe (ICL being the UK's answer to IBM at the time). The extracts were to populate end-user applications written primarily in Excel and Access (and some legacy DB2 applications to a lesser extent). The team flattered itself that it was following RAD (or Rapid Application Development) principles (an early precursor of Agile if you are to young to remember). In reality, it was more like rabid application development. They had secured "hero" status by the time I joined the team part-time but it was starting to wane as the support burden of rushed, poorly developed code increased exponentially. As the business had become somewhat dependent on this house of cards, and as I was already a part-time member of the team, I was moved into the team full time. By this time, apart from the occasional contractor, me and my new boss (who had also been in the IT department originally) were the only ones who regularly coded the Data General. Others could do it, and were probably better qualified and more experienced programmers, but the bulk of the work was on the ICL and in new technologies that were intended to replace the legacy systems. As someone who had originally worked in the business in a clerical capacity, rather than having an academic background in computer science, I had been left in the boiler room of mainframe support and it had dawned on me that my career needed a change of direction. While I wasn't going to get to play with all they shiny new toys, moving to a team that wrote things in Access and Excel did seem more interesting than mere COBOL. At that time though, Excel was only on the cusp of adopting VBA. So many of the Excel macros were written in Excel's own macro language. Anyway, this was when first cut my teeth on VBA and SQL. I was taking some Open University courses at the time too, so my awareness of things such as object orientation and relational databases was expanding. Initially, I was very impressed by what the team had done. These guys were geniuses I thought. Well, they'd have to be to understand the truly appalling code that they'd written! It was a downright liability! It was good for me though. I got, what is to this day, my best ever bonus when I saved the whole damned edifice from breaking down. We had five million pounds worth of business riding on what was a complete shambles. It sat on an Access database on a single PC. Supposedly, it was being backed up to the Network every night ... but it wasn't. The disk on the PC crashed and died and we were left with nothing. Except, that we had a copy taken a month or so previously that we had been using for test purposes. From this and recovered data extracts, and others that I created from scratch to plug the holes we were able to restore the situation - but it was a close run thing. I think it is for reasons like my story above - the appalling liberties taken with Access, poor management, the fact that it was often used by gifted amateurs, but not in accordance with sound principles, that Access has acquired such a bad name amongst developers. But I have a deep affection for it. As a now Senior Business Analyst it has been a most faithful friend for a very long time. It is a wonderful and much maligned tool. Of course, as you point out, it has its limitations - although I did once encounter a contractor (who wrote some very elegant code) who claimed that it was perfectly possible to create a system based on Access that could service up to fifty users. I have no idea if this is correct. I mean, surely it all depends on how frequently the users access the system (if you excuse my pun). Anyway, I was mainly a fan of it for what it could do for me, rather than to build applications with. I mainly use it to data mine. Often a SQL server database connected via ODBC using access queries or SQL server queries (stored as pass through queries in Access). Combining the data available from enterprise sources with local data from wherever can be very useful. I do also, on occasion attempt a partial prototype to make a point about what could be although as a BA I gave to tread carefully lest I am accused of stepping in the toes of the solution domain that developers tend to claim for their own (with a certain degree of justification to be fair but that is the problem with BAs who have a background as a code monkey such as me!).

Wow, right on time. I needed this review in this day and time of endless apps. I am a 20 year Access enthusiast that needed this review.

Hi Professor Lisa, Thankyou so much for this very well explained video. I find your voice and diction great. I am looking forward to watvhing your other videos. Kind Regards Ralph from Australia

Hi Lisa, Where can I get your book from this video?

Hi Lisa Great depth of knowledge! I am old school from VisiCalc days. Any one good book for Access you might recommend. Just too many out there for review. Thks

Hi Lisa. Is there any way you could post a summary of the key points in each video as well as access to the files used in these videos so we can work along with the steps in these videos. I need to have a way to remind myself and remember what each video is about. I will likely end up with an ebook to review this comprehensive study.

The CENGAGE online books are horrid! They only use serif fonts that are impossible for people with visual impairments to read! On top of that their text looks like it was photocopied because it's blurry. Not to mention their search box is useless and the read to me voices are monotone robots that put you to sleep in minutes. So, thank you for doing a good job teaching it because I wouldn't have learned well from this book!