Customer Reviews

Access 97 Programming for Windows for Dummies

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I bought this book only because it was the only Access VBA book I could find at the time. After starting with it, I found others. I now have a library of 6 VBA books, but this is the only one I call my "bible" for programming VBA. This book covers ALL of the basics and is easier to read then any other VBA book I have ever read. My hat is off to Rob Krumm!!!!

This is among the best computer books i bought. It is a bridge between a beginner access user and a beginner access programmer. It answered a lot of my access VB questions and opened me a window of SQL. Easy to follow, welll organized and excellent CD samples. However, the book required a certain amount of knowledge of VB programming. I could not have enjoyed it without my previous experience in VB. Be carefully, real dummies!

I bought this book last fall and I still keep referring to it. I picked up something from almost every chapter that I could use in my databases. It doesn't waste time covering general Access features. The Dummies title is misleading, because you have to have a fair amount of Access knowledge to be able to get through it. But you won't need any programming knowledge. (If you do, try VBA for Dummies)

It gives a good description of what a recordset property is and how it works with bookmarks. It tells how to pass parameters to procedures, the difference between seek and find, and it's got a little bit about ActiveX.

The book comes with a CD that has two extra chapters on it. The "Publishing Data for the Web" chapter has allowed me to set up forms that create web pages automatically when the forms are closed. I can keep my web data current without having to remember to do it. It showed me how to embed the HTML code directly into VBA code. It even describes how to manage a web site from inside Access. The second chapter has more debugging info and ways to document your database.

While this book did contain a good deal of useful information and was generally easy to follow, there were a large number of errors and inconsistencies. Many times I entered VBA or SQL code straight from the book only to receive error messages. The install program provided on the CD ROM would not install properly, although it was pretty easy to copy the databases and extra chapters manually to the hard drive. Also, the lack of a GLOSSARY! and a sub-average Index were major liabilities.

This book does not really fit into the "for Dummies" classification. I think they may have done it a disservice by giving it that label, as many who would benefit from it, may not recognise its potential. It presumes a previous knowlege of database programming principles and familiarity with using Access97 applications.

I am making the transistion from writing dBase/FoxPro code over to playing "find the secret button" with Access97. I know exactly what I want to do and could write out the dBase code in a moment, but finding where to click to cause the "wizard" to create the necessary code has been frustrating. This book takes a totally different approach from any other I have examined and there have been quite a few.

The others start at the GUI end, Rob Krumm starts with the code modules and SQL. He also covers the extensive debugging resources of Access97 which other authors hardly mention. GUI is covered along the way in this context.

This book wasn't very helpful at all. It tells you what the code is and how to write it, but not how to use it in design. It is however a decent VBA book. But I would suggest that if you want to learn VBA buying "Beginning Access 97 VBA" then maybe use this book as a reference guide. I didn't feel that it was a good design book though. Please keep in mind this is only my interpretation of the book.

I'm a dummy and I understood this book. It's well written, logical, thorough and useful.

A better title for this book would have been, "How to get the most out of Access with the least amount of programming". The book seems old but most of the information seems to apply for versions of Access at least up to and including 2000.

If you have taken an intro Access course with some VBA, have dabbled with some SQL and have a real world problem to solve with Access you'll find this book an indispensable resource.

If you haven't used Access before and need to be led gently by the hand or if you are a professional programmer, this book may disappoint you.

I own several IT books and Access books in particular. But this and an older one part of the "How to" series are the ones that I still look up regularly to-date to the point where they are nearly falling apart.

Why? Krumm's book gives very good examples of how to squeeze the most out of the Access visual designer to create Access forms that address real world problems with a minimum of coding. It's a relatively small book but it packs more interesting how-to's than books four times as large which would have you stay up all night debugging code. But why? You'd be better off spending your precious time learning Oracle, DB2, etc.

As long as Walkenbach doesn't write Access books, Krumm's book will be close at hand on my computer desk.

The Excel 97 Programming for Windows for Dummies by John Walkenbach was a great book for learning VBA for Excel, and it included coverage of some advanced topics. Each chapter kept building your understanding in a logical way until finally advanced topics were explained. Based on my experience with the Excel 97 Programming book, I purchased the Access 97 Programming book by Krumm. However I was quite disappointed with the Access 97 Programming book. It's coverage was spotty with some select in-depth examples. As an example, the coverage of the RunCommand was two example statements: DoCmd.RunCommand acCmdWindowCascade and DoCmd.RunCommand acCmdOptions. The explanation for RunCommands was as short as the two commands. It seemed that virtually every time I was looking for help on a VBA issue, there was nothing relevant in the Access 97 Programming for Windows for Dummies book.

I have been reading the book, and tediously following the examples and tutorials. About half way through I am unsatisfied. The book shows a lot of code development but forgets to tell how it is useful ("why"). (The writer presumed the reader doesn't have some programming in mind?) There are very few good, complete, useable/stealable/adaptable examples. And the reader is not "led" through the manners in which the code can be engaged in a program. It spends an inordinate amount of time on code for limited usefulness programming features.

Additionally, I have found (so far) three places where the code doesn't work; I presume someone updated Access and the book's examples were not tested or someone did a lazy revison.