What Can You Do with Access?

Let s start with the issue of function. What are you most likely to do with Access? There is an incredibly wide range of possibilities. Here are just a few ways someone might use Access at work:

• Develop a sales inventory database that interacts with point-of-sale software, updating inventory levels automatically at the close of each business day.

• Create a database for patient accounts in your optometrist s office that stores individual patient records, includes examination results, tracks office visits and prescription changes, and prints out a reminder card automatically one month before each patient s yearly checkup.

• Design a back end for a Web application, in which users take an online survey and answer questions about your company s product. The results are saved in an Access database, and can be used in further analyses and reports .

• Add a personnel database to your system that keeps track of each employee s start date, semiannual reviews, performance, payroll, bonuses, commendations, and vacation time.

  Note  

  As you begin to work with Access, you ll no doubt discover ways in which you can put the program to work for simple and not-so-simple data management uses. Once you discover how easy it is to create and work with data tables in Access, you won t have an excuse not to organize your data better.