Databases
are all around you. Have you ever waited at the doctor's office
while the receptionist punched in your information? Or asked a store employee to check their system
for a special item? Then you've seen a database in action. The
truth is, they're so useful, you see them all the time. With Microsoft Access, you can manage your
own database - to suit the needs of your business, or maybe the company you work for. "But what exactly is a database?" Well, it's a collection of information - or
data - that's stored on a computer, allowing you to enter, access, and analyze it in a
way you never could on paper. Let's think about that. Before computers, what sort of paper records
do you think the doctor's office kept on file? Certainly a list of patients and their contact
information also their medical history, and a list of past appointments. That's how databases work, from the simplest
to the most complex. They're basically a collection of lists - not on paper, but on your computer,
where programs like Access make it possible to organize your data, make it searchable,
and so much more. Let's take a look. Say you're a hard-working amateur baker. You
might decide to keep a database of all the cookies you know how to make, and the people
you make them for - your friends and family. A simple database, because it only contains
two lists. If you were a professional baker, your database
would contain more. You'd have products and customers, and other things to keep track
of, like prices, sales units, and a list of orders. "Does Access actually keep these things in
a big, long list?" Not quite. Instead, it uses tables (like the
ones in Excel) to list things in a little more detail. Take this example from the amateur
baker's database. It lists friends and family, but also important
information like who has a nut allergy in the rest of the table. So. If a database is essentially a collection
of lists stored in tables - and you can build tables in Excel - why Access? Why do you need
a database at all? Let's compare. While Excel is great at storing and organizing
numbers, Access is better at analyzing and connecting other types of data; for example, names and descriptions, or your
friends and their favorite cookies. The databases you'll be working with in Access
can actually understand how different lists and their contents relate to one another.
We call this a relational database - for its ability to understand relationships - and
it's really what sets Access apart. Let's think about what that means while we
go back to our amateur baker's database, and build a third list to keep track of batches
of cookies and who they're for. It's easy to see the relationship here - all
I did was pull Dwane from this list, and Shortbread from here. Access can see and use that relationship too,
but Excel can't. All of these things are completely unrelated
as far as Excel is concerned. That means you wouldn't be able to pull from
one list to another. Eventually, you'd find yourself typing the same thing over and over,
every time you needed to refer to Dwane or your shortbread recipe, or Dad and chocolate
chip. In short, Access thinks more like you. It recognizes that the items in these three
lists are connected. That makes entering, searching, and analyzing data so much easier
- whether you have two lists or twenty. Less to type, less to keep track of. Even the most complicated tasks can be made
simple and user-friendly once you understand how Access and databases work.