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katylava on Jul 08, 2007

i agree! that is all.

redwolf on Jul 08, 2007

Heartily agree on that

FallenAngel on Jul 08, 2007

M$ Access...yuck, yuck, yuck! Actually come to think of it - M$...yuck, yuck, yuck!

MrDee on Jul 08, 2007

Access front end SQL back end not quite so sucky.
can you move to VB Express or C# Express instead?

InternetONE on Jul 08, 2007

If it's Microsoft...it blows.

heinzelman on Jul 08, 2007

I hear msft haters but no alternatives....

katylava on Jul 08, 2007

i'm not a microsoft hater. i love excel.

heinzelman on Jul 08, 2007

access, when used for its intended purpose is a good tool, I guess I over-reacted as I hear many complaints when people don't understand...

gswd on Jul 08, 2007

Any Open Office fans here then? I use it for word processing and spreadsheets, but then again that is about all I would use M$ products for also.

anti on Jul 08, 2007

Open Office all the way! It really saves a lot of frustration.

katylava on Jul 08, 2007

bleh... open office is too slow. and it doesn't scroll smoothly. i don't have much use for word-type documents, but excel... excels. no matter how complicated and interlinked my workbook gets, i don't have any problems with excel (on windows... on mac... different story).

i think access is ridiculous because it's even harder to use than working with a database via command-line. but then, i don't use dreamweaver for a similar reason, and a lot of decent web professionals think it's a great tool, so what do i know.

marcoftheweb on Jul 08, 2007

Different strokes for different folks, I suppose. Personally, I think Access is designed for individuals highly experienced in computing but not much coding (IT/power users, not software engineers). There is a difference, you know. :-)

IMHO, the learning curve for creating a fully functional application with Access, complete with forms-based data entry and custom reporting, is a lot less steep than trying to do the same thing with just about any other framework of tools. Obviously, it's not designed for humongous distributed environments, but that certainly doesn't make it a product worthy of bashing. In some scenarios, less is more, if you know what I mean.

louiemctool on Jul 08, 2007

OpenOffice is the cat's <<censored>>!!

anti on Jul 08, 2007

eh?

louiemctool on Jul 08, 2007

cat's ass..

bee's knees..

shizzle fo'rizzle..

:)

louiemctool on Jul 08, 2007

yeah, i'm a dork

:)

anti on Jul 08, 2007

LOL So that means you like it?

Open Office I mean.

louiemctool on Jul 08, 2007

si

anti on Jul 08, 2007

'k. Seemed like a penguin would, anyway. :)

louiemctool on Jul 08, 2007

not a total MS hater. i haven't found an IDE that's better than Visual Studio if you want to quickly create a windows application...

NetBeans would be nice if someone could tell me how to turn off the auto-snap-to in the form editor...

rajr19 on Jul 08, 2007

i'm so confused - does blows mean it rocks - or it sucks

anti on Jul 08, 2007

I am not up on all the hip lingo, but I always thought blows=sucks=squirts.

louiemctool on Jul 08, 2007

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA....

i think i just wet myself laughing...

:)

anti on Jul 08, 2007

It just seemed right for a MS thread.

MrDee on Jul 09, 2007

MSFT programming pays my mortgage, feeds my cat, keeps my wife in shoes...
It's not a bad way to earn a living.

terryapodaca on Jul 15, 2007

I wasn't bashing Microsoft. I am also a ASP.NET, C# developer by day (PHP/Python/Ruby by night)...and pays the bills. I just don't like Access. Why use Access when you have SQL Server too? I mean, I finished the work that made me want to post this...but I just don't get it.

mik on Jul 15, 2007

I have made use of database functions in OOo's Calc but I just updated my installation (of Open Office) and it seems they now have a database app, 'Base' — I haven't so much as opened it yet and don't have particular plans to, but if you're looking for an alternative to Access, it's worth checking out.

Any frustrations I had with OOo Writer or Calc seem to be resolved with the current version (2.2.1).
There were several versions in between that and what I had been using, but I've become too reliant on automatic updates or at least reminders, and it doesn't occur to me to go look!

marcoftheweb on Jul 15, 2007

I believe my first statement still holds. Access and SQL Server are different technologies, each with their own set of strengths and weaknesses. Determining which one to use should be dependent on the requirements of the project. Different projects favor different database solutions. (And, like mik stated, there are certainly other choices like OpenOffice. Maybe you want to try mySQL or DB2 or Oracle. It all depends on the situation.)

In your case, if you're developing a web site with the .NET Framework, then you're likely to be right: SQL Server is probably your best bet. But that certainly doesn't mean Access databases are always a bad choice for other projects. In some scenarios, it might make more sense than SQL Server.

In fact, it's amazing how few people realize that you can really do SQL with a simple text file or a spreadsheet. There are drivers designed to do just that. Obviously, these technologies are going to be less robust than a powerful DBMS, but, as I said before, sometimes less is more.

MrDee on Jul 16, 2007

Access is a fair prototyping tool - sadly users and managers confuse it with a finished product.
then complain if it corrupts, does not scale, freezes, becomes difficult to maintain....
Access is NOT a multi-user database (no matter what the marketing team tell you)