Rating: 
Summary: All that glitters is not gold...
Review: Beautiful cover, 1500 pages and 2 CD ROMs! What a bargain eh? Except for busy people attempting to develop real time and real- world applications quickly. I imagine it has everything you need to know about Access 2000 - but I become infuriated with their on-going (forever) example of a pet hospital of all things! I'm attempting to set up a marketing budget and do not want to have to play around with dogs, cats etc. and their need for anti-tet shots. I do not have the time nor inclination to try to imagine what their examples would translate into in the real world. Enuff already!! Use the example for a chapter but get into business examples and a variety would be helpful. Arghh!
Rating: 
Summary: Outstanding for new Access 2000 Users
Review: Bought this book at a conference and loved it. Thought its tutorial style and consistent example throughout the entire book made it a winner. Very easy to read and I learned alot in each chapter. I thought the many screen pictures made this a really good book. I have bought many comouter books and this is the best one ever.
Rating:
Summary: This book is excellent
Review: Buyers -- This book is a relational database book. It is at the beginner to intermediate level. I have been using the Access Bible since 1996 and now use it to train others with it. Access is a tool that must be used on a continual basis in order to master the product. It is not a tool that can be mastered in a day as there is so much detail. However once you learn this book and the basic elements, the options are limitless for the types of data that you can track using an Access database. I'm a business student, so my preference is to build financial, marketing and customer service applications by combining my knowledge gained from the raw elements of this book along with what I have learned in business school.Stay focused on learning this tool, and over time you will definitely reap the rewards. I am an advanced user now and have other more advanced books for VB and SQL server related knowledge.
Rating:
Summary: This book is excellent
Review: Buyers -- This book is a relational database book. It is at the beginner to intermediate level. I have been using the Access Bible since 1996 and now use it to train others with it. Access is a tool that must be used on a continual basis in order to master the product. It is not a tool that can be mastered in a day as there is so much detail. However once you learn this book and the basic elements, the options are limitless for the types of data that you can track using an Access database. I'm a business student, so my preference is to build financial, marketing and customer service applications by combining my knowledge gained from the raw elements of this book along with what I have learned in business school. Stay focused on learning this tool, and over time you will definitely reap the rewards. I am an advanced user now and have other more advanced books for VB and SQL server related knowledge.
Rating: 
Summary: Most definitely not a Bible!
Review: Don't buy this book, it's worthless for a beginner and for an advanced user also. It's too complicated and poorly organized for a beginner, it randomly introduces a lot of unexplained new terms, which make it's reading more that frustrating. For an advanced user (I became one after reading a ton of other books) it's superficial and does not concentrate on the real aspect of data base design and implementation.
Rating: 
Summary: Only good if you want REEEELY basic stuff.
Review: Don't get me wrong, it's well written, but it's a superficial coverage of all topics. Nice overview, but even for someone brand spankin new to access, this coverage will seem a little condescending.
Rating:
Summary: Look elsewhere
Review: For a book of this size, it's amazing that I never find what I'm looking for in it. I guess that's because the book is mostly fluff. As another reviewer stated, I end up finding my answers in the on-line help. For example, this morning I needed to learn about Access security. It's not even mentioned in this book. That's unforgiveable for a "Bible." Yesterday I needed to look up record locking. The "Bible" has practically no references to it. I was far better served by the Access on-line help. The back cover says "Inside, you'll find complete coverage of Access 2000." Well, I'm still looking.
Rating: 
Summary: Good for Newbies, Good reference for old hands
Review: Great for learning the basics of relational database design and the basic access object design and interaction. It is well written and the layout makes it an excellent reference book. If you are looking for a book that will help you to create a workable application from little or no knowledge of databases this is the best that I've seen.
The sections on ADO and VBA however do not contain enogh info on the basic Architecture of Access and Objects to make it useful to the beginner and are too sketchy to be of any real use to advance users or developers.
Rating:
Summary: Good for Newbies, Good reference for old hands
Review: Great for learning the basics of relational database design and the basic access object design and interaction. It is well written and the layout makes it an excellent reference book. If you are looking for a book that will help you to create a workable application from little or no knowledge of databases this is the best that I've seen.
The sections on ADO and VBA however do not contain enogh info on the basic Architecture of Access and Objects to make it useful to the beginner and are too sketchy to be of any real use to advance users or developers.
Rating:
Summary: Sloppy, rushed effort that poorly rehashes previous edition
Review: I am very, very disappointed with the book, which I purchased last week. It has obviously been rushed to print. The diagrams are often difficult to read because wording in the diagrams is "washed out." If that weren't bad enough, it appears to be unedited. For one example, the book includes the statement "Once your table is saved, however, if you change a field name that is also used in queries, forms, or reports, you have to change it in those objects as well." Five pages later, a second sentence completely contradicts the first: "In previous versions of Access, changing a field name usually meant that any queries, forms, or reports that referenced that field name would no longer work and had to be manually changed. Access 2000 automatically seeks out most occurrences of the name and changes it for you."
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