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Welcome! POS Database & Order Form Guide

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Welcome to Microsoft Access Developer Level 14. In this course we will cover the first five lessons of building an Easy Access POS (point of sale) system in Microsoft Access. We will discuss the database structure, walk through planning out the tables, relationships, and fields, and begin constructing the actual tables using sample data. We will also start building an order form that uses categories, products, and options, preparing for future lessons on multi-select list boxes. Additionally, we will create a form to select groups and people for scenarios like school billing or rewards programs, with flexible configuration options.

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Prev: D14
Next: Lesson 01

Keywords

Access Developer, point of sale, POS system, POS customization, database structure, table relationships, database prototyping, order form, product options, multi-select list box, group selection, family billing, reward programs, sample data, VBA, SQL

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Transcript

Welcome to Microsoft Access Developer Level 14 brought to you by AccessLearningZone.com. I am your instructor, Richard Rost. Access Developer 14 includes the first five lessons in the Easy Access PLS, that is, point of sale system. So whether you are one of my developer students watching all the classes in order or you are interested in just the Access PLS system, this is the right lesson for you.

For several years now people have been asking me to build a POS system in Access. There is nothing really available on the market right now for POS systems that are built in Microsoft Access that you can customize and that are reasonably priced. So for my developer students, you are going to get a lot of new techniques that I will be covering in this series. But for those of you who are interested in just the POS, you can pick up those lessons by themselves.

This is also the first time that I have recorded videos for a new class and I post them online as they are being recorded, which has given the students the opportunity to post feedback and ask questions between lessons. Then I can either answer them on the website or I can include those answers in the next set of videos.

Even though right now Developer 14 is finished, because I always record the introduction slide last, you can still get in on developing the POS system because Developer 15, as of right now, it is July 2020, has not been recorded yet, so you can still get involved in the real time database development.

We will talk about exactly what is covered in just a few minutes, but I am using Microsoft Access 2019 with Office 365. You should be okay with pretty much any version of Microsoft Access, I would say from 2007 on.

To my developer students who are following along, I do suggest Developer 13 before this one. If you are one of the students taking this as just the POS seminar, of course you should have a good working knowledge of Microsoft Access, preferably including some VBA and some SQL.

What does today's class include? First, we are going to talk about the database structure. One bit of feedback that I have gotten over the past couple of years is that my students want to see more development of the database before we start building the database. What does it look like on paper? How do I put all my fields together and my tables? How does everything relate together? We are going to spend a good amount of time doing that.

About a half an hour of the first lesson is just going to be talking about what fields to include, how the tables work together, relationships, and so on. You are going to actually see me prototype the database. I have built a lot of screens up here in PowerPoint that are going to show you how things are going to look when it is done. As you can see, these are just simple diagrams.

Then we will start actually building the tables. I am going to spend a good hour building the tables, going through all the fields, explaining why I am doing things the way that I am, giving you more in-depth understanding of how these things go together. Not just how to build the table, but why I do things a certain way. We will fill in a bunch of sample data, we will see how things are going to work.

Then we will get started actually building the order form where we can pick a product category, then a list of products in each category, and then each product can have different options. Here you can see burgers. We have got the kids burger, and then we have got a list of options: add bacon, add lettuce, add a toy, cook well, and so on.

In the next class, we are going to talk about multi-select list boxes, which we have not done yet, and that will allow you to pick multiple options on that option list.

Finally, in today's class, we are going to build a form to allow you to pick a group, and then a person in that group. This is handy if you are doing billing. For example, if you are a cafeteria that does school lunches for students, you can have your list of groups be the family. Then of course, the list of people would be the students. If you are a restaurant, you might not want to have groups or people. Or you can get information from them and put them in for reward programs.

However you want to handle it, a lot of places just do all cash options, that is fine too. This will be completely configurable, and I will show you all kinds of different ways to do things.

If you have any questions about the material posted in class, just scroll down to the bottom of the page that you are on, watching the video on the website, and you will see that each one of the lessons has its own separate forum where you can post questions about that particular class. However, if you have general questions about Access that do not necessarily fall under this lesson, you can go to the Access forums, there is a link, and you can post all of your questions there.

Click on the link below the video to get started with lesson one.

Intro

Quiz

Q1. What major project is introduced in Access Developer Level 14?
A. Creating a point of sale (POS) system in Microsoft Access
B. Building a payroll management database
C. Designing a customer feedback survey
D. Developing a project management dashboard

Q2. Why have students requested a POS system in Access?
A. Lack of customizable and reasonably priced POS solutions built in Access
B. Difficulty using Microsoft Excel for POS purposes
C. Need for a mobile POS system
D. Requirement for cloud-based POS features

Q3. What is special about how the Access Developer 14 course was recorded?
A. Videos were posted online as they were recorded, allowing student feedback between lessons
B. All videos were recorded first before going live
C. The course uses only text-based lessons with no video content
D. The course was crowdsourced from student submissions

Q4. Which Microsoft Access versions are generally suitable for following along with the class?
A. Versions from 2007 onward
B. Only Access 2019
C. Only the original Access version
D. Only Access 365

Q5. What prerequisite knowledge is suggested for those enrolling only in the POS seminar?
A. Good working knowledge of Access, preferably with some VBA and some SQL
B. Only basic typing skills
C. Knowledge of Adobe Photoshop
D. Expertise in C# programming

Q6. What is one area of student feedback that influenced this class?
A. Wanting to see more of the database structure and planning before building
B. Requesting fewer practical examples
C. Preferring to skip table design and start with forms
D. Focusing mainly on macros

Q7. What will the first half hour of the class primarily focus on?
A. Discussing which fields and tables to include and how they relate
B. Building queries
C. Programming only in VBA
D. Designing print layouts

Q8. Which form will be started after table development?
A. The order form that allows picking categories, products, and options
B. The end-of-day sales summary form
C. The report printing form
D. The invoice generation form

Q9. How will product options be selected in the order form?
A. By using a list with options such as add bacon or cook well
B. By entering options manually in a text box
C. By selecting options from a drop-down of employees
D. By importing options from Excel

Q10. What topic is scheduled to be addressed in the next class?
A. Multi-select list boxes for choosing multiple product options
B. Importing data from Excel
C. Building a report for sales
D. Creating charts and graphs

Q11. What is the purpose of building a form to pick a group and a person in that group?
A. To allow selection for billing scenarios, such as family groups in school lunches
B. To randomly assign a group to every transaction
C. To ensure only cash sales are accepted
D. To automatically print a receipt

Q12. How does the course suggest handling different customer tracking needs (like rewards programs)?
A. The system will be configurable for groups, people, or all-cash options
B. The system only allows tracking people and groups
C. Only cash options are permitted
D. Customer tracking is not discussed

Q13. If you have a general Access question, where are you directed to post it?
A. The general Access forum via a provided link
B. Directly emailing the instructor
C. On a third-party social media site
D. In the product reviews section

Answers: 1-A; 2-A; 3-A; 4-A; 5-A; 6-A; 7-A; 8-A; 9-A; 10-A; 11-A; 12-A; 13-A

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

Today's video from Access Learning Zone is Developer Level 14, where we begin the first five lessons focused on building an Easy Access POS, or point of sale system. I am Richard Rost, your instructor. Whether you're following along with all my developer courses in sequence or you're interested only in point of sale functionality within Access, this class is the right starting point.

For quite some time, I've had many requests to create a POS system in Microsoft Access. There really isn't a solid POS solution on the market today that is built in Access, fully customizable, and affordable. In this series, I will introduce some new techniques that will benefit all my developer students, but if your main focus is on learning to build a POS, you can easily just follow these particular lessons.

This course also marks the first time I released new instructional videos online as I recorded them. This approach allowed students to give feedback or ask clarifying questions between lessons. I could then either address those questions directly on the website or work the answers into subsequent lessons in the series.

At the time I recorded this introduction, Developer 14 was completed. However, if you're interested in contributing ideas or following the development process as it unfolds, Developer 15 had not yet been recorded as of July 2020, so you can still get involved and take part in real-time database development.

I will outline all the topics covered in this class in just a minute, but in terms of Access versions, I am using Access 2019 with Office 365. You should be able to follow along as long as you're using Access 2007 or newer.

If you're one of my regular developer students, I recommend completing Developer 13 first. For those just interested in the POS seminar, you should already be comfortable with Microsoft Access, including some knowledge of VBA and SQL.

The class starts by looking at the database structure. I've often heard from students that they want to see more database planning and structure before tables are actually built. We'll spend a significant portion of the first lesson focused on mapping out which fields and tables we need, how all the data will relate together, and what the layout looks like conceptually. I have PowerPoint diagrams to give you a clear sense of the end goal, showing simplified versions of the main forms and structures.

From there, we move on to actually building out the tables. I will spend a substantial amount of time walking through every field, explaining each choice in depth so you understand not just how to build tables, but why particular design decisions are being made. We'll also enter some sample data and see some workflows in practice.

Next, we build the order form, which will let us pick a product category, display the products within that category, and allow for product options. For example, if we set up burgers, you might see a kids burger with possible options like bacon, lettuce, a toy, or different cooking preferences.

In the following lesson, I'll cover multi-select list boxes, which will make it possible to choose multiple options from that list. This is something we haven't covered before.

Lastly, in this session, we will create a form that lets you select a group and then select a person within that group. This feature is useful in billing scenarios, such as cafeterias that provide school lunches. You could have a family as the group and individual students within that group. Restaurants may not need these groupings, but it is helpful for loyalty programs or customer management. The entire setup is customizable, so you can implement it any way your business requires, or simply handle all transactions as cash if you prefer.

If you have questions about anything covered in this course, each lesson page on my website has its own dedicated forum for course-specific queries. For broader questions on Access not directly related to this lesson, there's also a general Access forum.

A step-by-step video guide walking through everything I have described here is available on my website at the link below. Live long and prosper, my friends.

Topic List

Introduction to the Access PLS (Point of Sale) system
Overview of database structure for POS
Designing database tables and relationships
Prototyping the database layout
Building tables with detailed field explanations
Entering and using sample data in tables
Building the order form for product selection
Selecting product categories and products
Setting up product options (custom modifiers)
Previewing order screen layouts in PowerPoint
Building a form to select groups and people
Configuring options for customer and group handling
Using forms for different billing scenarios
Forum options for class-specific questions

Primary Topics

POS system architecture, database structure planning, table creation, field selection, relationships, order form basics

Secondary Topics

group and person selection forms, billing configuration, user scenario customization