Can anyone share their experience in using Microsoft Access in cr.

[Renee]

My company is looking to create a database containing our customer
information. We have approximately 1500 accounts. Just wondering if
Microsoft Access is the best route to take as I am not so familiar with all
the systems available.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

 

[Duane Hookom]

Access can definitely handle 1500 accounts. There are other issues such as
the number of concurrent users, etc.

If you are unfamiliar with Access, this might not be a good project to start
if it is business critical. Have you looked at any software designed for
customer information management? There are lots of programs out there and
purchasing could be a lot cheaper in the long run than learning a program
and attempting to build your own.

If you want to do this with Access, you must (have to/required/no
choice/don't say maybe) buy "Building Microsoft Access Applications" by John
Viescas
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0735620393/ref=ase_viescaconsulinc/102-0661747-3621765.

This book has 4 complete working applications; 1 of which is a Customer
Support app. You would recoup the cost of the book the minute you open it.
There are other books that might be good additional reading for beginners
(to experts) and you can check John's site for more recommendations
www.viescas.com.

 

[Margaret Bartley]

My company is looking to create a database containing our customer
information. We have approximately 1500 accounts. Just wondering if
Microsoft Access is the best route to take as I am not so familiar with
all
the systems available.

Access is wonderful for applications with complex data relationships, but
not a lot of concurrent users.

As someone else pointed out, you don't want to start on this as a beginner.
Depending upon your company's business situation, you might be best off to
hire someone to build a first-step application, there are a zillion
already-done apps, and many experienced Access developers, and then learn to
build the reports and queries yourself, or add additional fields, later.

It's much easier to learn from a project that is working, and is probably
the best use of business money, than trying to do it from scratch, yourself.

Just make sure you get someone who understands that you want to become
independent, and not someone who will try to create a captive client.

 

[Alex White MCDBA MCSE]

Access is an excellent product for this type of requirement, you will be
re-inventing the wheel though (if you create a contact management system
from scratch) as your requirement has been modelled by nearly all Access
developers in the past (Contact Management), go to the Microsoft office
website and see if there is a template to suit you needs, there are also
template applications that come with access, open access, new database,
templates on my computer, click on the databases tab.

http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/templates/CT011359381033.aspx

Spend some time looking at the templates to see if they suit you, if they
are 90% of what you want, then modify/create the other 10% within the new
database created from the template.

and good luck,