I think most reader's experience will have been EITHER "When I started
to use Access I found it a real pain in the eye but I eventually grew
accustomed to its quirky ways," OR "I've always considered Access to
be an absolute joy to use."; comments from regulars about "a steep
learning curve" make me think most readers will be of the former
opinion. However, consider that most people whose experience was,
"When I started to use Access I found it a real pain and I eventually
tired of its quirky ways," will have long ago ceased to read this
group.
You asked so here's my experience of Access in a nutshell. Background:
as team manager had been using the SQL language for many years e.g.
reports; as Excel coder had discovered DAO and was (unwittingly) using
Jet SQL. Sent by employer on a beginners' Access course: very
confusing (what has a many-to-many relationship got to do with a
query? etc) Took a role as consultant in a software house and strongly
encouraged to use Access for certain tasks. Tried really hard to like
Access e.g. reports were good but couldn't decide whether forms were
great because they were just like reports or whether forms were really
dumb because they were just like reports. Couldn't understand why the
Access object model didn't give me access to the data. Discovered SQL
view and ditched the query builder designer thing. Rediscovered DAO
and was momentarily back on track but applications kept blowing up
i.e. had unwittingly discovered DAO's bad architecture and memory
leaks (sorry to come over all aaron). Discovered ADO and ditched DAO.
Discovered that I only needed Jet; also, had to support more than one
SQL DBMS and didn't like colleagues' 'lowest common denominator'
approach of Access linked tables. Discovered standard/portable SQL and
SQL DDL and finally ditched Access. Remain a loyal fan of Jet but
dismayed that nearly a decade on the Access user interface still
hasn't caught up with the engine. Moved to another software house, was
told the shop's standard was disconnected ADO and realized I was not
the lone ranger.
So my fundamental 'usability' issue is that the Access user interface
is not SQL language friendly e.g. it shows me three 'join properties'
I have to deduce which one means LEFT OUTER JOIN. One stand-out
annoyance is the 'nag' messages: Jamie says, "DELETE FROM MyTable,
please." Access says, "You are about to delete 1 row(s) from the
specified table... Are your sure you want to delete the selected
records?" Jamie says, "I was just now but what do you mean by
'selected' and why can't you decide whether they are rows(s) or
records...?" Perhaps Access just rubs me up the wrong way
Jamie.
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