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If you already have a Microsoft Access database for your small business or even have your business data in a spreadsheet, Access makes it easy to take data from your desktop database or spreadsheet and put it out on the web. All it takes is a $12.50 per month subscription to Office 365 for business. With that you get the latest desktop versions of all the Microsoft applications plus Office apps that run on any device including mobile devices. In addition, you get SharePoint 365, Microsoft’s web tool to secure, store, share, and view information on the web.

With this subscription, you’ll have everything you’ll need to build an Access web app that runs in a browser. The app is built Read More

Today I want to share a case study from a client of mine.

Side Note: Because I sign non-disclosure agreements with my clients and I respect their privacy and trade secrets, I can’t name names or get into details.

A few years back, a client in the manufacturing business contacted me about automating their order, production, and shipping data processes. This was a relatively small (under 50 employees at the time) and growing company. They were doing all of their data management either on paper or in spreadsheets. Surprisingly, Read More

I did an Internet search for “is Microsoft Access dead?” and found lots of conflicting information on this topic. This seems to be a hot topic in the database world with all kinds of people chiming in, some of whom by the comments they’ve made, don’t know much about Access or relational databases. I read in my search that Access is useless, a “toy”, Excel can do anything Access can do, stuff like that.

Since I’m an Access database developer, I guess you could say I have a bias. However, let’s look at the facts. Read More

Side Note: Because I sign non-disclosure agreements with my clients and I respect their privacy and trade secrets, I can’t name names or get into details.

This may sound corny but one of the things I love about my job is helping people. I’ve helped many small businesses over the years get organized, more efficient, and consequently improve their sales and services. I take pride in the ability to sit with a new client, learn what they do and need and then build a solution to that need.

Recently, I did a job for a small organization that’s in the business of helping people. They had someone develop an Access database for them a few years back that tracked client activity. They need to report totals of this activity to various agencies on a regular basis. The database they were using was not done very well. It could not be used from year to year and had some other serious flaws. The client knew this. The client was spending way too much time on this reporting and not enough time on doing what they love, which is helping their clients. Read More

The other day I was talking to a friend in the landscape business in Bucks County, PA. He told me he was spending hours putting together job requirements, and employee and maintenance schedules. It was getting to the point where he was spending almost as much time on paperwork as he was running his business. He’d looked at off the shelf software and it was never quite right for his needs. He was surprised at how inexpensively he could get database software designed that fit his needs exactly.

Then he asked what the process of designing a database would be like.  I’ll share my answer to him with you today since it’s a good example of what’s involved in database design. I told him:  Read More