Question for the MVP's

[David C. Holley]

What certifications for Access does MS provide? Also how specific is the
MVP designation - application level or more general?

 

[Ken Snell [MVP]]

MS has no ACCESS certification at this time, to my knowledge.

The MVP identity is an award, not a certification, by MS for people who
contribute to the software community. MS awards it for a specific software
application (e.g., ACCESS, EXCEL, Internet Explorer, Windows, FoxPro, etc.).

 

['69 Camaro]

Hi.

Microsoft has an Access certification . . . sort of. There's an Access exam
available for the Microsoft Office Specialist certification for Office 2003,
XP, and 2K. The Access exam is available for the Master certification and
the Specialist Certification, so one could become a certified Access
Specialist. You can find out more on this Web page:

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/mcp/officespecialist/requirements.asp

HTH.

Gunny

See http://www.QBuilt.com for all your database needs.
See http://www.Access.QBuilt.com for Microsoft Access tips.

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[Ken Snell [MVP]]

Thanks for the link, Gunny... hadn't run across it in any of my MS-site
cruises....

 

[David C. Holley]

So what you saying is that I need to get off my butt finish the DB that
i've been building for my specific line of work and then sell it?

 

[Ken Snell [MVP]]

< chuckle > I'm not sure that that is what I "said".....!

 

[Paul Overway]

Ken was just pointing out that the award is usually for community help
provided by the MVP for a specific software application (i.e., Access). It
isn't that you need to write an application to receive an MVP award, rather
it is recognition of your contribution to the support of some Microsoft
product.

So, you don't need to ever finish your application...you just need to get
off your butt and post useful answers to user questions in the newsgroups.
;O)

 

[Larry Linson]

So what you saying is that I need to
get off my butt finish the DB that
i've been building for my specific
line of work and then sell it?

No. Many MVPs were selected because they gave a lot of good answers in
newsgroups -- for a long while, that was the only way they measured
"contributions to the Microsoft software user community"; in recent years,
however, they take other things into consideration: authorship of books and
articles, involvement in local and national user groups, etc.

One of my colleagues was recently awarded, who rarely ever visits
newsgroups, but who has a long history of serving as an officer in multiple
user groups, and who is one of the best teachers of software development
topics I have ever known.

In my case, I was a prolific poster to the USENET newsgroup
comp.databases.ms-access, but wasn't awarded until I began posting more
frequently in the microsoft.public... newsgroups. Others told me that my two
websites, one containing examples and the other links to resources and user
group information, and my long-time involvement in two Access user groups
were also discussed.

Only the Microsoft employees who run their MVP program know the exact
requirements and only they select who is awarded, and they don't discuss the
procedure or specifics. At the appropriate time, they announce who has been
awarded, in private MVP newsgroups.

It is an annual award for what one has done in the previous year -- there is
no guarantee that anyone will be re-awarded for the next year. Many are,
simply because they keep on contributing to the user community.

Larry Linson
Microsoft Access MVP

 

[David C. Holley]

Actually the DB that I'm building is a smaller part of a bigger project*
that I've had clunking around in my head and I just figured out how to
go about getting it developed.

*One that will run on one of the greatest machines ever buildt - the
AS/400 aka iSeries server.

 

[David C. Holley]

Oh thanks for enabling the uncommitted, procastinator in me. Of course,
I have thought about posting some articles on my site of things that
I've put together solo or with the help of others. For example, one that
I'm particulary proud of is a combo box that lists the proper names of
resorts (e.g. Disney's Grand Floridian Resort) into which you can type a
short description (e.g. Grand) which does not appear in the list and
have the proper name selected.

 

[Rick Brandt]

Actually the DB that I'm building is a smaller part of a bigger
project* that I've had clunking around in my head and I just figured
out how to go about getting it developed.

*One that will run on one of the greatest machines ever buildt - the
AS/400 aka iSeries server.

Prepare to be disappointed. Even IBM is finally admitting that the ISeries
simply doesn't do SQL and ODBC nearly as well as other platforms and they are
scrambling to catch up.

They are rock-solid and never go down and in the past that was something that
Linux and Windows boxes couldn't match, but nowadays everybody can put a box
together with impressive up-times.

I've been doing Access front ends to some IBM iron for several years now and a
four figure xeon SQL Server will absolutely blow its doors off. We're in the
midst of a big warehousing project where we are off-loading data from the
ISeries to a SQL Server box to speed up reporting and ad-hoc querying that
doesn't need up-to-the-minute data. Even our prototype wintel box (dual P3 1GB
RAM) will run the same queries significanty faster.

 

[Marshall Barton]

This might help your understanding: