The smart way to learn the latest version of Microsoft Office Access 2007—one step at a time! Build exactly the skills you need by working at your own pace through easy-to-follow lessons and hands-on practice files on CD.

Amazon.com® Reader Reviews (Ranked by Helpfulness)

Average Amazon.com® Rating:  Based on 12 Ratings

Not like previous Step by Step series - 2009-04-19
Reviewer Rating:
I teach Access at a local community college. In the past, I used the Access 2003 Step by Step and found it a good starting point. I should have looked at this book before I used it for my Access 2007 class. Not one page is devoted to relationships between tables. The only information is in the Glossary where it is defined as "An association between common fields in two or more tables." The reader is never told about Primary Keys, other than a mention to "notice the Primary Key icon ... to the left of the ShipperID field. The value in the Primary key field is used to uniquely identify each record." With this kind of detail, the publisher should have saved some trees.

The examples for importing from various other programs are so weak that they leave the reader with no real idea of what is involved in a real life situation.

Three people authored this book, yet not one of them ever thought to include the why of tasks, only the how.

Save your time and pass on this edition. Maybe the editors will look at the shoddy work, read some of the reviews, and find authors who understand Access and can communicate how the program is to be used.

How to find book - 2009-09-14
Reviewer Rating:
This is a great book for people who want to know where Microsoft hid all the menu options that we were used to. I don't mean to be belittling to those who thought the book was great but it is clear they don't know what they are missing, literally. I can't see how anyone can think they have a well rounded understanding of Access after reading this book. This book sets the newbie up for a big fall flat on their face. No talk about relationships, the only mention of Tabs has to do with the Ribbon bar. Wait until they start moving fields around and wonder why when they hit the tab key their flying all over the page.

But I guess it is all summed up by the authors cutting their own throats on page 9 under Understanding Database Concepts. They tell you that what makes Access so great is that is a Relational database and not a flat database, but then never once tell you about how to set up those most important relationships. So without that knowledge you are going to be setting up flat databases. For the life of me I can't understand how they missed this critical process especially AFTER they pointed out its importance. And we won't even go into normalization of the data.

And to top it off they drop in VBA code. Scary! Still haven't figured out what they were thinking there.

I will admit it takes you by the hand gently but it hides your eyes from a lot of what is really going on behind the scenes. Guess that is why the authors give you so many different versions of the same data base, so they could load the deck in their favor. I fear newbies will be in for a real shock when they try to replicate what they thought was so simple,(and was), in this book.

Barely skims the surface - 2009-07-06
Reviewer Rating:
I am a bit disappointed in this book as I was hoping it was a little more advanced than it is. Step by Step? Those are some huge steps. After finding much of or more information online this book did not help further my understanding. The exercies are easy to get lost in and at times I just had to give up and went on to the next section. Save your money and just look up tutorials and documents online and you'll get more understanding than you will from this book. One nice thing about the package is that it comes with a pdf copy so it was easy to take with me and not have to lug the book around. Only plus side if you ask me.

career builder - 2008-12-01
Reviewer Rating:
I have had no training in Access during college. My career requires an in-depth knowledge of access. I needed a book that could take me from the very beginning to an advanced level and this book does that.

MS Access Step by Step - 2009-06-29
Reviewer Rating:
This is a superb tool (much more that just a book!) for all levels of MS Access users. It is particularly valuable for those of us wishing to achieve Microsoft Certified Application Specialist for Microsoft Access.

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