Running Microsoft Access for Windows 95 [With *]

I wanted a beginning book on Access, which still went into Power User mode at some point. This book fills the bill. The author uses three complete applications -- a college advisor's database, a music booking agent's application, and a (simple) wedding guest database. Through these three applications, with very nice lookup tables, connected queries, and involved reports, the author shows how to do it. First with the Wizards, then directly in Access. I found this book an excellent introduction to Access, showing where all the features are hiding and how best to use them. The only warts are that the directions are not always clear what screen you should be on, or how you got there. It can be figured out, but does take a bit of time investement. The time invested is well rewarded, however, in terms of your comfort with what you can do with Access.

This book is an excellent reference for both database beginners and advanced programmers. The introduction to database objects and structure is thorough and well-paced for someone new to Access in particular and databases in general. The tutorial on macros and VBA modules are comprehensive yet readable and will advance the skills of even an experienced programmer.

I recommend his books to everyone who seriously wants to make databases in Access. Mr. Viescas does not only describe all the functions in Access, but he also cares about the theories behind datamodeling . And that's a thing some authors forget. To me, building a database and make it work means three things: knowledge about the underlaying theories, knowledge about how the software works and a bit of experience. Mr. Viescas wrote a very fine book in which the first two are described in a very clear and readable way. With this book you should have one of the best books written to learn more about Microsoft Access. The only thing you have to do is to try things out and get some experience. My compliments to Mr. Viescas. He did a great job! Note: There is also a great part about Visual Basic for Applications in this book. If you want to learn more about Visual Basic, you could start here. For me it was a good introduction and I noticed that I learned Visual Basic quite fast.