Quick Queries #48
By Richard Rost
10 months ago
Bug Reports, Remote Access, Sub Name Conflicts
In this Microsoft Access tutorial, I will answer a variety of viewer questions including why I don't regularly cover new feature updates or bug reports for Access, options for working with Access databases remotely, creating project management templates with Gantt charts, handling sequential numbering for customers, working with multi-language support, using triple state checkboxes, resolving duplicate function names, quick data import from sources like ChatGPT, and the differences between timer functions in VBA.
Prerequisites
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Keywords
TechHelp Access, TechHelp Quick Queries, project management template, Gantt chart, AccessForever.org, NoLongerSet.com, Beta Channel, stable channel, SQL Server linking, Remote Desktop, Access Database Cloud, block insert record, Append Query, sequential annual numbers, overlapping windows, triple state checkbox, text to columns, ChatGPT data import, multi-language table, ambiguous name detected, module reference, timegettime, timer function, winmm.dll API call
Intro In this video, we'll talk about several Microsoft Access questions, including where to find reliable news about Access updates, how to use Access databases remotely, setting up a project management template with a Gantt chart, generating custom sequential numbers for customers, working with data imported from ChatGPT or Copilot, handling triple state checkboxes, and dealing with duplicate function names in VBA. We'll also discuss ways to import tab-separated data, using Excel's Text to Columns, setting up overlapping windows in Access, and timing code with both the built-in timer function and the Windows timegettime API.Transcript Welcome to another TechHelp Quick Queries video. This is number 48, brought to you by AccessLearningZone.com. I am your instructor, Richard Rost.
Quick Queries are quick answers to queries about Microsoft Access, which may or may not include queries. But they're all queries. It might not be about queries, so I'm confused too. Anyways, let's hit the mailbag.
One of my students, Sarah, just emailed me and says, "I wonder why you don't post updates when Microsoft releases new features for Access, or when there are bug reports and fixes. I've seen other tech channels and blogs cover that kind of stuff, and I was curious why you don't include it in your videos or on your website. Love the TechHelp videos, by the way. They've saved me more than once."
Well Sarah, you basically answered your own question. I don't cover that stuff because there are some other great channels that do cover it.
For example, there are two that I highly recommend. AccessForever.org - in fact, you can see right down here, they've got an article for June 2025 changes. Also, Mike Wolf has some great content on his website, NoLongerSet.com. He does a week in review, which I republish on my website, and he also covers anything that's important. They're excellent resources and I highly recommend checking them out and subscribing to their mailing lists. I do; that's where I get my news from.
Now, if there's a major bug out there that could crash your whole database or cause real problems, then I'll definitely let you know about it, or when they post a fix for it. And if there's a new feature that's actually useful or game-changing, I'll definitely cover that too.
Most of the time though, I get my information from the same places you can, so there's really no need for me to reinvent the wheel.
Also keep in mind that sometimes new releases, especially if you're in the Beta Channel or grabbing the latest builds, can be a little buggy. That's why I like to wait until stuff is fully baked and stable before I use it myself or recommend it. I stay in the stable channel. I don't want to risk issues with either my teaching databases or my production systems.
And yes, I've got a video coming out soon to explain what all the different channels are. There's the Beta Channel, and there are some others if you want the super stable release. That's what I do. That way, the new updates aren't immediately pushed out to you. So yeah, I'm not ignoring these updates. I'm just filtering out the noise and focusing on what really matters to me and to my viewers. I'm all about teaching you how to do stuff, not necessarily reporting bug fixes and things like that.
When a new feature comes out that is stable, I will definitely make lessons about it.
All right, let's head over to YouTube.
First off, thanks guys for all the congratulations. I just posted the video that we reached a thousand TechHelp videos and 400 Extended Cuts, and I got my fifth MVP. I've already got dozens of congratulations. You guys are awesome. Thank you very much. I appreciate it and I'm looking forward to the next thousand.
Next up we get - well, first up really - first question.
Musa asks, "Can you make a project management template with a Gantt chart as yours? This is the most important thing." Yeah, I've kind of done this already. I built a basic project management template in Access. It lets you do things like set up different categories, pick your date range, that kind of stuff. You can click on the different cells here. So it's available; here's the link. I'll put a link down below.
All right, for this one I had to pull out Google Translate: "Can you work with Microsoft Access remotely from other parts of the world? How about SQL?" Well, I get asked this all the time. In fact, I've got a whole page put together about this. Here's the page. There's the link. I'll put a link down below.
But in a nutshell, don't use file sharing services like Google Drive, OneDrive, or Dropbox. That will corrupt your database. You can put your tables online either using SharePoint or what I recommend is SQL Server, which is relatively inexpensive to set up. You just put your tables up there, link them to your Access database, and then anyone with your Access database can connect to the tables. I have a whole seminar that covers how to do that.
You can use Remote Desktop. For example, I use this one on vacation because I leave my Access database running all the time in my office here. I just fire up my laptop, I can remote directly into my Access database, and it's like I'm sitting at my desk.
If you don't want to leave a computer running in your home or office, there are services like Access Database Cloud, where they basically have the PC in the cloud running your Access database. You can set it up for multiple users too. So lots of options - check it out.
Next up, Edison says, "Can you upload one about generating a block insert record from SQL?" I don't have any idea what you mean by "block insert record." If you're talking about inserting a bunch of records, then you could import them by whatever means you want to import them and then you can use an Append Query or something like that to pull them into your table.
But I'm not sure what you mean. So if you could give me some more details, that would be great. Always post it as a new question, because I don't usually look for replies to older questions. Just post it and give me some details and maybe I can help you figure it out.
Next up, "I want to keep a sequential number for each customer. Upon selection of a customer, will generate a sequential number like customer name - sequence - 2025." Yeah, you can do this based on whatever criteria you want.
Here's another video that I did that teaches you how to do sequential annual numbers. For example, it's 2025 so the first record would be 2025-001, then 002, and so on. Instead of using the year, you could very easily use the customer ID or the customer's name or whatever you want. Watch this video; that should show you enough to do what you want. If not, come back and let me know and maybe I'll make another video about it.
Next up, T-Covings sent me a link to another YouTube video. This is in reference to my Fitness Database series. In part three, I mentioned that I'm on the quest for the perfect protein bar, and so he sent me a link to another video. This video is pretty good. I actually like Dr. Mike, but it's extremely long-winded. It's 31 minutes of a lot of him just being entertaining, which is fine - that's great - but I just want to get to the point. This happens a lot when I watch videos.
As a video creator, I have a hard time watching other people's videos on educational things. If someone sends me a link to an Access video, I just want them to get to the point. So I get where some of you are coming from when you tell me, "Hey Rick, just get to the point already." So I'm going to show you my trick for quickly summarizing a YouTube video.
What I do is I come down here in the description. By the way, you are not allowed to do this with my videos. Find "Transcript," show transcript. Here's the transcript text. They don't make it easy for you to copy all this. You can't click here or whatever. What you can do is come all the way down to the bottom of the transcript, click here, hold your mouse button down, and drag all the way up. It'll come up to the top because you can't hit Control+A or it'll get all the text on the page. Copy this all to the clipboard, Control+C.
Now where are we going? You guessed it - ChatGPT. I type in "summarize briefly, please give me the results," then I paste in all that transcript. Here's your result, and now you can read this, and there's a very short, brief transcript of 30 minutes of video.
Again, don't do this to my videos or at least let it play in the background. But thanks for the video. I started watching it and I like Dr. Mike. I've watched his videos before. I'm in the middle of recording myself, so I gotta get to the point here.
Personally, I haven't tried any of these bars. One thing that I've learned is that people's tastes align - it's the same with movie reviews and stuff. Everyone's taste is unique. What Dr. Mike likes, I might not like and vice versa. In movies, I usually disagree with movie critics. Some movies that I think are great, they think are awful and vice versa.
I will agree with this, try to avoid the sugar alcohols. They will make you gassy or worse. I've learned that one myself.
I will say my favorite so far is made by Barebells, their cookies and cream is amazing. It's 20 grams of protein for 210 calories. That's not bad, a little tiny bit of sugar, but overall it's a delicious bar. If you want to try it, I'll put a link down below.
Morton Robinson said, "I have no clue which version of Access this is, but both your form view and design view look nothing like mine, so I can't follow along here." Now Morton is talking about my Yes-No Fields video, which was released about three years ago. So that would put it in about 2022. Let me see here. Yep, 2022, January. So I was probably using Access that was roughly equivalent to 2021, because I've had the Microsoft 365 subscription since they first started offering that.
There's a couple things - either you've got a really old version, like before 2007 (that's when they made the major redesign, added the ribbon, and all that) or my forms and stuff might look different to you because I'm using overlapping windows, not the default full page stuff that Access normally uses by default.
In fact, I've got a whole video on that because people are often confused by it. I prefer overlapping windows. These are small forms inside of Access: your main menus over here, your customer forms here, your order forms here. The default is this tabbed interface where every form fills the full screen inside of Access. I don't like that at all. I like classic old-style windows.
Go watch this video, I'll put a link to it down below. That will teach you how to set your system to overlapping windows, which is the correct way to use Access. If it's what I want, it's the correct way. There's my way and the wrong way, right? I'm just kidding. That's probably why you're confused with the interface difference.
While I'm on that video, I noticed another comment from about a year ago. Sometimes I'll answer a question that I see someone post on an older video, and then I realize that there's a comment that I didn't answer a year ago. Sorry, I don't always have time to get to all of them.
But TMD63 says, "How do you use yes/no/not used fields?" Well, that would involve using what's called a triple state checkbox. That's this guy right there: yes, no, and I don't know.
In order to do this, you have to set your checkbox in design mode to triple state is equal to yes. You can't use a yes/no field because yes/no fields literally can only store yes or no. So you have to use a different field, like a number value. This video explains it. Go check it out.I'll put a link down below. Sorry for taking a year to answer you. My bad.
Ren B says, "Great start to the series, Richard," talking about my fitness database series again. The only hiccup was using MS Copilot to do the AI query, so I showed people how to get some sample data. Get it from ChatGPT and then copy and paste that into your Access database. It produced what appeared to be the same data as you with GPT. But when copying the data and accessing it, it dumped the complete line into one field instead of separate fields. I will work on that to see if I can get it to do it right. This is something that you can practice yourself. You could just use Notepad in Access. Here, let me show you.
So here's my TechHelp free template. Let's go into the customer table here. I got first name, last name, and email. Let's say I got a list of first names, last names, and emails, and I want to get them into my database here. Now I'm gonna open up Notepad. Let's say I've got Joe, and then I like to put tabs between them. When I ask for data from ChatGPT or whatever, I ask for it to be tab separated. Joe tab Smith tab [email protected]. Sue tab Jones tab [email protected]. We'll do another one. Jim tab Wills tab [email protected].
What I'm gonna do now is just select these guys and copy. If you come right over here and just paste into a field, it's gonna put all that data in that one field. If I Shift+F2 zoom in, you'll see it's all in there. That's not what we want to do. So hit Escape. What you want to do is see how this box is selected? It's got that little pink border around it. We don't want this row because this row's already got stuff in it. Make sure you're on a blank new row.
With that border, select how many fields you're pasting. We got three fields: first name, last name, email. Doesn't matter how many records. Now hit paste. There you go. That's how you bring your data in whenever you're using Copilot and ChatGPT told to give you a tab separated list. So here I ask ChatGPT to give me a tab separated list in plain text with some sample data. I need first name, last name, and email address. Give me five records, no header information. It gave me that, but this might not be something that, when you copy and paste it, it might see it as a space. I said "are those tab separated" and it's like, "they're tab separated." Put them in a code box. I always ask for data like that to be in a code box when it's giving you source code like VB code or JavaScript.
So this looks like it's properly tab separated. Now you should copy this data, come back up here, do the same trick, select three fields, and paste. There you go. That's how you bring it over. There are other ways you could do it too. Another way, if you get comma separated, the easiest way to break them up honestly is just drop them into Excel and then do a text to columns. I got a whole separate video on text to columns. You could take data that's comma separated and it'll throw it into columns. You can transpose it if you want and do all kinds of stuff to it.
That's just easier. Sometimes you get it into Access, then massage it in Excel, depending on how much data you're talking about. If you're talking about thousands of rows of data, then you're gonna want to use a proper query. But if you've got a handful of records and you want to just quickly massage them, just do it in Excel.
Next up, this user says, "I have installed French and German language packs in Windows and set something current system locale to use Unicode for worldwide support. I also have set VB under VB tools options editor format to accept normal text and set the font. Despite that, Access still doesn't accept French and German symbols." This is in response to my multi-language video.
In my video I teach you how you can set up a table where you can have your labels and other things inside your database have different languages in them. I do not have any experience whatsoever with setting up the actual multi-lingual versions of Windows, Office, Access, or any of that stuff. I speak only English and I've got no experience with that. So I'm including this here in this video. Hopefully, someone else who's watching might be able to offer you some help because this is outside my area of expertise.
You might also want to contact the guys over at Access Forever. I know they have a lot of experience with multi-user stuff. They've got members in Germany and Austria and all kinds of other European countries. Maybe they would be able to help you, and Will Karls is a great guy. Give them a shot maybe.
Next up, this is a good question from Ariel Ramirez. He says, "Love the series. It's great. If it can be perfect, just work out the name of your functions so they can be implemented without changing your code. For example, if MS Access has a William T. Riker function and you create a Thomas Riker function, you have to go in and replace all your William T. Riker functions with Thomas Riker in your code, but also name your function William T. Riker. Your functions will execute first. No replacing, no two functions." Oh, ha, okay.
I think what I'm trying to gather from this is you're saying that I should make all of my function names different from what you've got in your database. In fact, one of my moderators, Sammy, just came up with this idea for me with my new calendar database that I'm releasing. I've got some functions that, if you dropped my stuff into your database, some of the function names might be duplicated. That's just a problem with Access. Let me show you two things that might help you out here.
First of all, let's say in here I've got a function or a subroutine called status. All status does is, when you click a button here, it'll status whatever you have in there into this box here. That's all that is, just status "Hello World."
Now, let's say you are introducing some new code and you want to use status, but it's named something else in your database. All you have to do is make yourself a little helper function. Just call it new status or whatever, public sub newstatus(s as string), and then in here say status s. Your newstatus function will then just call the old status function.
But more important than that, let's say you have code that you imported from somewhere else that also has a status function. Let's create another module, Create Module. Let's make a public sub status in here as well, s as a string, and all this guy does is message box s instead of putting it in the status box. Save this as newmod.
Now we have globalmod and we have newmod and they both have a status function in them. You could probably guess right now, if I go to Debug - Compile, right? Ambiguous name detected: status. Because it doesn't know which status I'm talking about.
So what you can do is, if you want to reference a specific status function, just call it by its module's name. So this one is the old one, you'd call it globalmod.status. See, there's a bunch of functions that are in that one. If you want to call the other one you just say newmod.status. This is the newmod. I'll put this one first because it's a message box.
Now you can use both status functions. You just have to refer to which one you want. Save it, now it should Debug - Compile, and then when I click the button they'll both run. First is that one, and then the second one runs.
So if you import someone else's code into your database and you're getting ambiguous names detected, you're just going to have to go through and find out which ones are duplicated and either rename it, which, if that's not too intense, you can do, or, if you want to keep the code the same, just go through your code and replace the name by itself with whatever mod it's in and that will fix that problem. It might involve a little work, but you only have to do it once.
Could I name my stuff differently? I could, but so could you, and that's easier for me if you do. I hope that answers your question. I'm not exactly sure what you meant, but I appreciate the Riker reference, and I think I answered your question. Maybe if not, let me know, but don't post it as a reply to this one, post a new one because I sometimes don't see replies.
Next up is a question from John. "Why don't you use timegettime which is accurate to the millisecond?" He's referring to my timer function video.
In this video, the point of teaching you about the timer function is that it will allow you to get fractions of a second accuracy when trying to determine what stuff in your database is running slowly. By fractions of a second, it's like one-thirteenth of a second, so it's not quite milliseconds, but it's close. It's good enough and it's easy enough for the purposes of this video and for what I think 99.9 percent of people would ever use Access for as far as tracking accuracy.
There is a function called timegettime. It is part of the Windows winmm.dll library, so you have to make an API call to it. Here's some sample code I had ChatGPT throw together for me. I have not tested this, but I have used timegettime in the past. If you do need actual millisecond accuracy, this will work. This will return the elapsed milliseconds since Windows started, so it is actually millisecond-level ready. It doesn't depend on system time changes, and it's ideally better for tracking real-time tasks, but it's not that much better than the built-in timer in Access. Unless you're benchmarking something that's 10 milliseconds, you really don't need it.
Whereas timer is built in and is simple, no declarations are needed. It's good enough for most forms of timing logic. Of course, you have to worry about bitness too; this is the 64-bit declaration. If you have any 32-bit users, then you can't use that, you have to declare it differently. Great question and I hope that answers it.
All right folks, that's gonna do it for today. Don't forget to check out my Captain's Log if you want to read my daily rants about random topics, some of which include IT, database stuff, sometimes Star Trek, sometimes life in general, so check it out.
Don't forget to check out the merch store. We got hats, sweaters, hoodies, bears, mouse pads, all kinds of stuff with my logo on it. If you want some, check it out, there's a link.
That's gonna do it folks, that's your quick queries for today. What is today, Friday the 11th of July 2025? Have a good weekend and be safe and don't blow your fingers off with any leftover fireworks. That's it. I hope you learned something. Live long and prosper, my friends. I will see you next time.
TOPICS:
Access project management template with Gantt chart
Methods for remote Microsoft Access use
Access tables online with SQL Server
Using Remote Desktop for database access
Access Database Cloud services overview
Appending multiple records using Append Query
Generating custom sequential numbers for customers
Explaining overlapping windows vs tabbed interface in Access
Changing Access interface to overlapping windows
Using triple state checkboxes in Access forms
Importing tab separated data into Access
Using Excel Text to Columns for data import
Handling duplicate VBA function names in Access
Referencing functions by module name in VBA
Using the VBA Timer function for performance timing
Using timegettime API for millisecond accuracy in Access
COMMERCIAL:
In today's video, we're talking about why I do not cover every new Microsoft Access update or bug fix and where you can find the best resources for that information. We'll discuss working with Access databases remotely, setting up sequential numbers for customers, handling yes-no-not used fields, combining data from ChatGPT or Copilot, multi-language support, and dealing with duplicate function names in VBA code. Plus, we will cover timing code in Access using both the built-in timer and the Windows timegettime function. You'll find the complete video on my YouTube channel and on my website at the link shown. Live long and prosper my friends.Quiz Q1. Why does Richard Rost not regularly post updates about new Microsoft Access features or bug fixes?
A. Because there are already other resources that cover these updates well
B. Because he does not use Microsoft Access regularly
C. Because he does not consider updates important for Access users
D. Because Access no longer receives updates
Q2. Which two resources does Richard Rost specifically recommend for Access news and updates?
A. SharePoint.org and SQLServer.com
B. AccessForever.org and NoLongerSet.com
C. AccessOnline.net and DatabaseNews.com
D. MicrosoftTechNews.com and AccessGuide.org
Q3. When does Richard say he will notify viewers about Access bugs or new features?
A. Only for minor design changes
B. Only if the bug is major or the new feature is really useful
C. Every week, regardless of importance
D. Only at the end of every year
Q4. What is Richard's preferred release channel for Microsoft Access?
A. Beta Channel
B. Insider Channel
C. Stable Channel
D. Fast Track Channel
Q5. Why does Richard suggest not using file sharing services like Google Drive, OneDrive, or Dropbox for Access databases?
A. They are too expensive
B. They can corrupt your database
C. They are too slow
D. They lack user-friendly interfaces
Q6. What solution does Richard recommend for accessing Access tables remotely?
A. Direct file access via email
B. Hosting tables in SharePoint or SQL Server
C. Printing tables and scanning them
D. Using Google Sheets with Access
Q7. What is the recommended approach for working remotely with Access if you want your Access database running in an online environment?
A. Use Access Database Cloud services
B. Only use on-premises networks
C. Migrate the entire database to Excel Online
D. Use a VPN with Google Drive
Q8. When importing sample data from AI like ChatGPT into Access, what method does Richard suggest for separating fields?
A. Use commas and paste directly
B. Use tab-separated data and paste into the matching number of fields on a new record
C. Always use XML formats
D. Manually type each field
Q9. If sample data from AI is comma-separated and not tab-separated, what tool does Richard recommend to help format the data before importing into Access?
A. Use WordPerfect to reformat
B. Use Notepad++ for conversion
C. Use Excel's Text to Columns feature
D. Use PowerPoint
Q10. How does Richard explain resolving function name conflicts when importing code modules into Access that have the same function name?
A. Rename all your own functions after import
B. Reference the desired function by its module name (e.g. modulename.function)
C. Delete the imported code
D. Place all functions in one module
Q11. If you need a third state (like "not used") in a checkbox in Access, which property must you set for the checkbox?
A. Set Control Source to TripleCheck
B. Set Enabled to False
C. Set TripleState to Yes
D. Set Locked to True
Q12. Why does Richard prefer using the overlapping windows interface in Access?
A. Because every user must use it
B. Because it looks more modern
C. Because it allows multiple smaller forms to be open at once
D. Because it is the default setting
Q13. Regarding language support in Access forms and labels, what does Richard recommend if you require multilingual support and run into issues with language packs?
A. Contact AccessForever.org for advice
B. Reinstall Windows in the desired language
C. Only use English in your database
D. Change your computer's region to French
Q14. When using the default yes/no field in Access, why can it not represent a "not used" or "unknown" state?
A. Because it only accepts text input
B. Because it is limited to yes or no values only
C. Because it is obsolete
D. Because it requires a triple state checkbox by default
Q15. If importing code from someone else causes "ambiguous name detected" errors in Access, what is the main cause?
A. The code uses reserved Access keywords
B. Duplicate function names exist in different modules
C. The database is read-only
D. The code is not commented
Q16. In discussing timer functions, why does Richard favor using Access's built-in Timer function over the more precise timegettime function?
A. Timer function is faster to type and supports milliseconds
B. Timer is built-in, simple, and accurate enough for most database needs
C. timegettime is only available on Mac
D. Timer function automatically logs events
Q17. What does Richard suggest if you want to keep two functions of the same name in separate modules and use both?
A. Only use the newer function
B. Reference the function using its module name (e.g., modulename.function)
C. Delete the older module
D. Change Access settings
Q18. For sequential numbering such as "customer-001-2025," what is Richard's general advice?
A. Use an Excel macro
B. Use existing auto-number fields only
C. Generate sequential numbers based on any chosen criteria with appropriate logic
D. Use customer names only
Q19. If you need to bring thousands of records into Access from an external source, what does Richard recommend as the best approach?
A. Input them one by one
B. Use a query designed for bulk import
C. Only paste into one field
D. Edit directly in Notepad
Q20. How does Richard recommend summarizing long educational YouTube videos for quick viewing?
A. Always watch videos at 0.5x speed
B. Use the YouTube transcript, copy, and paste it into ChatGPT for a summary
C. Skip to the last minute of the video
D. Only read the video comments
Answers: 1-A; 2-B; 3-B; 4-C; 5-B; 6-B; 7-A; 8-B; 9-C; 10-B; 11-C; 12-C; 13-A; 14-B; 15-B; 16-B; 17-B; 18-C; 19-B; 20-B
DISCLAIMER: Quiz questions are AI generated. If you find any that are wrong, don't make sense, or aren't related to the video topic at hand, then please post a comment and let me know. Thanks.Summary In today's Quick Queries video from Access Learning Zone, I address several questions about Microsoft Access, including why I typically do not cover updates and bug alerts, how to handle importing data, working with Access remotely, and other specific technical matters.
First, I want to clarify my approach to Access news and updates. I receive questions about why I do not post announcements about new features, bug reports, or fixes when Microsoft releases them. The reality is, there are excellent resources that focus on Access news and updates. Two I highly recommend are AccessForever.org, which regularly publishes summaries of recent changes, and Mike Wolf's NoLongerSet.com, where you can also get a weekly review. I rely on their updates myself. My own focus is more on teaching practical skills, not on reporting every new change unless a bug or feature is significant or disruptive. In those cases, I make it a priority to update you.
I also prefer to wait until new features become stable and fully tested before recommending them or introducing them into my teaching databases. For this reason, I stay in the most stable release channel for Access. I have a video coming up that will explain the different Access release channels for those interested.
Moving on to the mailbag, I recently celebrated some milestones and want to thank all of you for the congratulations and support. Now, let's address some questions.
Musa asked about a project management template using a Gantt chart. I have already created a basic project management database in Access that supports categories and date range selection, and lets you interact with the chart. This template is available on my website.
Another question was about working with Access databases remotely. Many people wonder if Access can be used over large distances or if SQL is necessary. I strongly advise against using file sharing services like Google Drive, OneDrive, or Dropbox to share Access databases, as this usually leads to corruption. Instead, you should keep your tables online using SharePoint or, better yet, SQL Server, which is relatively affordable to set up. Link your Access front end to those tables, and you're ready for remote work. Remote Desktop is another option; I use it to access my teaching database when traveling. For those who don't want to leave a system running at home, services such as Access Database Cloud are available, offering cloud-hosted environments specifically for Access.
Edison submitted a question about generating a "block insert record" using SQL. If this means inserting multiple records at one time, you can use an Append Query in Access after importing your records. For more detail, please provide additional information about your specific needs.
Someone else asked how to generate a sequential number for each customer, such as "customer name - sequence - 2025". I have a tutorial that covers creating sequential annual numbers, and you can easily adapt this technique to use the customer ID or name instead of the year. Watch that video and let me know if you need further help.
I also received feedback regarding my Access interface looking different from the default. This comes down to my use of overlapping windows rather than the default tabbed interface, which presents all forms full screen. I prefer overlapping windows, which allow multiple forms to be visible at the same time within Access. I have a dedicated tutorial that explains how to enable this mode.
On using triple state checkboxes to represent yes, no, and not used, you cannot use a plain Yes/No field because it only stores two options. Instead, set your checkbox control in design mode to triple state and store the value in a Number field. I have a video walking you through this setup.
A viewer shared some challenges importing sample data generated by AI tools like Copilot or ChatGPT. If your data is pasted into Access as one field instead of several, make sure to request or format your sample data as tab-separated values. In Access, select the appropriate number of fields before pasting, and your data will be placed in the correct columns. For comma-separated data, you can use Excel's "text to columns" feature before importing into Access. For large amounts of data, a query approach might be better, but for small samples, Excel is often the quickest solution.
I also heard from someone having trouble getting Access to accept French or German characters after installing language packs and adjusting system and VBA settings. Unfortunately, I do not have direct experience with configuring multilingual Windows or Access environments. I recommend reaching out to the team at Access Forever, as they have more expertise in international and multi-user configurations.
Ariel Ramirez raised the concern about function name conflicts when importing new code modules. If you have two modules in Access that each have a public sub with the same name, Access won't know which one to call. The solution is to specify the module name when referring to the function or to create a wrapper "helper" function that uses the intended one. Alternatively, you can rename the functions to prevent conflicts. This might involve a little code cleanup, but it ensures your database continues to work as expected.
John asked why I do not use the Windows API function timegettime for millisecond-accurate timing in Access. The built-in Timer function provides enough precision for almost all Access needs, measuring down to roughly one-thirteenth of a second. Using the API allows for actual millisecond ticks, but for general database tasks this added complexity is rarely required. If you truly need that level of accuracy and understand the necessary declarations (which differ between 32-bit and 64-bit Access), you may find timegettime useful.
To wrap up, remember that my website features my daily Captain's Log and a merch store for those interested. Thanks again for sending in your questions and comments. Please continue reaching out, and always start a new comment rather than replying to previous ones if you want a timely answer.
You can find a complete video tutorial with step-by-step instructions on everything discussed here on my website at the link below. Live long and prosper, my friends.Topic List Access project management template with Gantt chart
Methods for remote Microsoft Access use
Access tables online with SQL Server
Using Remote Desktop for database access
Access Database Cloud services overview
Appending multiple records using Append Query
Generating custom sequential numbers for customers
Explaining overlapping windows vs tabbed interface in Access
Changing Access interface to overlapping windows
Using triple state checkboxes in Access forms
Importing tab separated data into Access
Using Excel Text to Columns for data import
Handling duplicate VBA function names in Access
Referencing functions by module name in VBA
Using the VBA Timer function for performance timing
Using timegettime API for millisecond accuracy in Access |
