Future of MS Access

[Rose]

Hi All,

I have heard from a couple of contractors that I work with that MS Access
2003 is the last version of Access and that Access is becoming obselete.

I'm a huge fan of MS Access and I don't believe something until I hear it
from official or reliable sources. I'm not sure if the remarks these
contractors (web developers) are making are genuine. They seem to be
pursuading the customer towards a web based solution using this remark.

As of yet I haven't been able to confirm the rumours by searching the
Microsoft website, news websites, and other places on the internet. If any
thing, I have found only one recent article about the future of Access, and
it seemed to be fairly positive.

http://www.databasejournal.com/features/msaccess/article.php/3385961

Personally, I don't think Access will become obselete. Access serves it's
purpose as a file based database for small to medium sized databases, and a
decent front-end to large databases. Newer Microsoft technologies are more
likely to integrate rather than discard previous technologies.

Please reply to this thread if you have any information you would like to
add. I would certainly appreciate any links to official or reliable sources
on the internet.

Thanks

 

[Van T. Dinh]

Rumours are easy to spread, that's all.

Microsoft have been asking MVPs for possible additions / improvements for
the next version of Access.

 

[Ken Snell [MVP]]

And it's safe to say that the size of the development team within Microsoft
for the next version of ACCESS reflects the importance that Microsoft is
putting on ACCESS's future... it's one of the largest teams ever.

 

[Arvin Meyer]

Rose,

The 5 core Office programs (Access, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, and Word)
will be around as long as there is an Office suite. With over 250 million
Access users, it is highly unlikely that Microsoft will ever end Access
development. Without violating our NDAs, we MVPs can say that there will be
an Access 12. Much more than that, we are not really at liberty to discuss.
Suffice to say, that you can tell your web developers that they need to find
much more reliable sources for their information.
--
Arvin Meyer, MCP, MVP
Microsoft Access
Free Access downloads:
http://www.datastrat.com
http://www.mvps.org/access

 

[Larry Linson]

I have heard from a couple of con-
tractors that I work with that MS Access
2003 is the last version of Access and
that Access is becoming obselete.

They are repeating utter nonsense, and its not even _new_ utter nonsense.
Those who would _like_ to see it go away have been predicting the imminent
death of Access since version 2. If they'd had their way, there wouldn't
have been an Access 95, Access 97, Access 2000, Access 2002, nor Access
2003.

I don't know what marketing is going to name the next version of Office or
the software included, but I am confident that there will be one. And, if I
am any judge of implications, another version after that. That is, I am in
full agreement with Arvin -- as long as there are anywhere near the current
number of Microsoft Office users, it's not going to go away, and that number
is not decreasing, as far as I can tell. That would be like Microsoft
killing the goose that lays the golden eggs.

I'm a huge fan of MS Access and I don't
believe something until I hear it from
official or reliable sources. I'm not sure if
the remarks these contractors (web
developers) are making are genuine.
They seem to be pursuading the customer
towards a web based solution using this remark.

I think you are very perceptive. I would alter Arvin's suggestion: you need
to tell the _customer_ to get a better source of information than these
contractors with a vested interest. <G>

There are certainly situations which require a web application solution.
But, in my not-so-humble opinion, there are a great many more web
applications solutions than there are situations which require one. The web
idea was so exciting, that many, many customers wanted to be convinced they
needed a web solution and there were plenty of web developers perfectly
happy to take a shot at convincing them.

Larry Linson
Microsoft Access MVP

 

[Tony Toews]

I have heard from a couple of contractors that I work with that MS Access
2003 is the last version of Access

Absolute rubbish.

and that Access is becoming obselete.

Never mind that it's the best RAD tool out there for databases?

I'm a huge fan of MS Access and I don't believe something until I hear it
from official or reliable sources. I'm not sure if the remarks these
contractors (web developers) are making are genuine. They seem to be
pursuading the customer towards a web based solution using this remark.

Of course they are. And it'll take 3-5 times longer to build the
same app. And be a lot clumsier to use to boot.

MS have more folks working on Access for the next release than they've
ever had in the past.

Tony
--
Tony Toews, Microsoft Access MVP
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