Form tutorials?

[Ann Scharpf]

For the first time I am creating a database that is primarily for "end user"
usage. So I don't want people working directly in tables as I've done
myself. I am interested in a couple of things about forms and would like to
know if anyone can point me to relevant tutorials. So far, the MS training
page isn't showing the type of info I'm looking for and I would like more
step-by-step instructions than you get in the problem-specific responses
here...

I can see how to make a form look and work in a user-friendly way for
straight data input. My questions are related to having a user update
existing records. I'd like to learn how to:

- Have the user enter a few fields and click a button so Access finds the
related record(s)

- Have the user enter information on the screen but NOT update the record
until they press an UPDATE button

Can anyone point me to some tutorials on these types of topics? As always,
thanks very much for your help.

 

[John W. Vinson]

For the first time I am creating a database that is primarily for "end user"
usage. So I don't want people working directly in tables as I've done
myself. I am interested in a couple of things about forms and would like to
know if anyone can point me to relevant tutorials. So far, the MS training
page isn't showing the type of info I'm looking for and I would like more
step-by-step instructions than you get in the problem-specific responses
here...

Jeff Conrad's resources page:
http://www.accessmvp.com/JConrad/accessjunkie/resources.html

The Access Web resources page:
http://www.mvps.org/access/resources/index.html

A free tutorial written by Crystal (MS Access MVP):
http://allenbrowne.com/casu-22.html

MVP Allen Browne's tutorials:
http://allenbrowne.com/links.html#Tutorials

I can see how to make a form look and work in a user-friendly way for
straight data input. My questions are related to having a user update
existing records. I'd like to learn how to:

- Have the user enter a few fields and click a button so Access finds the
related record(s)

You can use the Combo Box Wizard to create unbound combo boxes to allow the
user to select a value and have it find the record for that value. Be sure the
magic wand icon is selected; create a new combo box; choose the option "Use
this combo to find a record".

- Have the user enter information on the screen but NOT update the record
until they press an UPDATE button

Ummmm... why?

This is often very frustrating and annoying for users. "YES, durn it, I DO
want to update the record, that's why I've been typing it!!!" You can *do*
this with some VBA code in the Form's BeforeUpdate event (blocking updates
until the button is pressed), but in practice this is generally neither
necessary nor user-friendly, since it's just an extra step.

If you're concerned about users typing data into fields with the intent of
FINDING data rather than UPDATING data, open the form read-only by basing it
on a read-only query (set the query's Snapshot property to true for example),
and provide a button to change its recordsource to an updateable query to let
them update.

Can anyone point me to some tutorials on these types of topics? As always,
thanks very much for your help.

John W. Vinson [MVP]

 

[Ann Scharpf]

Thanks so much! I will check these out next week after the holiday.