Microsoft Access 2000 Bible

Rating:
Summary: Not solution oriented enough
Review: I've been using this for a few weeks and like the accompanying CD which allows you to search the entire book easily. What I don't like is that too often I found myself struggling to find solutions that existed but were not documented. Like what do you do when you've set up a report and want to add a field that's not on the Field List. The trick is to go back and expand the query the report is based on to include that field but you won't find that in here. Instead you might (as I did) struggle with Text Boxes that allow you to build expressions based on the field you want, but you come up with an error message. Also they are so proud of their sample database that you find yourself having to go into it all the time to understand their explanations. I find myself, instead, turning to Access's online help for much of what I should find more nicely explained in this book, both with and without the examples.

Rating:
Summary: Not solution oriented enough
Review: I've been using this for a few weeks and like the accompanying CD which allows you to search the entire book easily. What I don't like is that too often I found myself struggling to find solutions that existed but were not documented. Like what do you do when you've set up a report and want to add a field that's not on the Field List. The trick is to go back and expand the query the report is based on to include that field but you won't find that in here. Instead you might (as I did) struggle with Text Boxes that allow you to build expressions based on the field you want, but you come up with an error message. Also they are so proud of their sample database that you find yourself having to go into it all the time to understand their explanations. I find myself, instead, turning to Access's online help for much of what I should find more nicely explained in this book, both with and without the examples.

Rating:
Summary: Access Bible 2000
Review: If you have Access Bible 97 wait for Access Bible 2002. Wish I did.

Rating:
Summary: Access Bible 2000
Review: If you have Access Bible 97 wait for Access Bible 2002. Wish I did.

Rating:
Summary: Beginners Only
Review: Most people that this book would help probably shouldn't be using Access anyway. It goes over the basics and not much else. Much of the information is found in the Access Help and is easier to find then in the book. It goes into detail on how to use the Wizards, which shouldn't need much explaination and fails to cover anything difficult. It doesn't take long before a database developer would be looking for a better book and tossing this one.

Rating:
Summary: a good reference
Review: The beginning and intermediate sections were clear and complete.
The advanced sections were more difficult but had more depth.
MACROS, HTML, SQL, VBA, and programming environment each
had about a chapter. I would definitly recommend this book
as a reference for anyone using access 2000.

Rating:
Summary: Really covers the new material
Review: The book is an outstanding tutorial of all basic-intermediate Access 2000 features. I loved the example that was used throughout the entire book. The CD followed the example perfectly and included great free software amd additional examples. I especially liked the coverage of MSDE projects, Access Data Pages and other new features in Access 2000.

Rating:
Summary: A waste of money
Review: There's something strange about this Bible series. I already bought quite a few books of this series. They are very attractive by their looks, usually very thick and most of the time a bit disappointing. This one really is. I have rarely seen a computer book that is so badly structured as this one, I really do not find my way in it. Not the book to choose if you want to learn access, not even good as a reference book, no structure, no depth. I really wonder why it is so successful...

Rating:
Summary: No structure at all
Review: There's something strange about this Bible series. I already bought quite a few books of this series. They are very attractive by their looks, usually very thick and most of the time a bit disappointing. This one really is. I have rarely seen a computer book that is so badly structured as this one, I really do not find my way in it. Not the book to choose if you want to learn access, not even good as a reference book, no structure, no depth. I really wonder why it is so successful...

Rating:
Summary: A beginner's book, and not even remotely a bible
Review: This book disappoints a lot due to its promising title. It covers the basics adequately, with step-by-step instructions and lots of screen dumps. There are, however, no VBA code examples, and in my view no information on professional database development. I could hardly imagine developing a sturdy application of some size without using at least some code and impose some limitations to what the user might do. This is a introductory book that needs some reality check on what a real application is, and given its present title I cannot recommend it.