Microsoft wants Office 14 to get along – Cnet article

We visit this blog to get first hand information about Access. Instead all other (ZDNet, CNet) all are providing information except Access Blog for Access 14. When we will have some meaty information about Access14 for Developers. best regards

It is sort of frustrating to see Access frequently talked about separately from the rest of the Office apps. It's like Microsoft can't quite figure out how to position Access...

I post this here (out of frustration) in the hope that the MS Access help system may be improved. Here is just one example to illustrate my frustration:

I want to find help on using the PivotChart (you know, the button on the Create->Form ribbon). I'd just like to know a general overview, since I don't always get the results I would expect when I drag fields into the various data boxes... So I press F1 and type in PivotChart...nothing sensible in Online or Offline help. Ok, so I try Pivot Chart, then "Insert a chart on a form", nothing remotely relevant comes up except some reference to a non-Microsoft site. What am I supposed to do? I think those are fairly obvious search terms. I know Access has come a long way since version 97, but the Access help system has not. Sure, the Access 97 help was not as pretty, but it worked beautifully. Context sensitive help would actually give you intelligent info as well. My frustration with PivotCharts are not the only example. This type of thing happens again and again. It's sad that your programmers have done such a nice job on the visual appearance and new features in Access, but those responsible for the help system are really letting you (and us, the users) down. What will the MS Access development team do to address this, or do you feel the help system needs no improvement?

CyrusB has raised a good point. Access 2007 could do with quite a few low-tech improvements, e.g. * Searching in Help could do with more info shown in the results. If I search on "controlsource" I get 10 results all looking exactly the same. How do I know which one might be on control sources in general as opposed to the control source of a textbox?

* Drop down lists in various places seem to have been set up in the days when screen resolution was a fraction of what it is today, e.g. in the VB Editor has only 12 rows and in Find dialog in the VB Editor allows you to search in 3 directions, but only shows 2 in the dropdown. This means it takes 3 clicks to choose "Up". In Access proper, the object selection drop down list at the top of the property sheet, e.g. in a form, has only 5 rows visible.

* The Expression Builder is too small. In particular the three columns are too narrow, such that I always need to widen them to see the names of objects. None of these is a major problem, but just make the use of Access a tad behind the times. Alan

PS Concerning the Expression Builder, resizing it does not work properly. Try opening it and then stretching it well to the right, then bring it back to where it was. Repeat a few times and you will see that the columns become so small you can't read anything in them. In fact if you are perverse enough, you can keep doing this until the columns completely disappear. PPS When will we get the Expression Builder back for use when editing code? Cheers, Alan

Here's another one in line with Alan's first issue (that just happened to me now)... In code, I put mouse on CreateQueryDef in the following line of code and press F1: Set qdf = CurrentDb.CreateQueryDef("qryOrders", strSQL) I get two duplicate topics for "CreateQueryDef Method" in the help page that comes up. I have to drill into each one to find out that one is for the database object, the other for the connection object. In this case, fortunately there are only two objects with this command, but in other instances I've had 10+ duplicate items listed. Surely, the object to which the method applies should be listed next to each item in the help page. While I love Access and appreciate the great work Clint and the team are doing, I find this aspect really appalling. Clint, any thoughts on whether the help system can be shown some love?

CyrusB, thanks for your comments on Help quality. I publish Access IW Help, along with two teammates. I know it can be difficult to get the right Help at the right time, and appreciate you taking the time to express your frustration, rather than just writing us off. I also want to encourage you and other folks to provide feedback directly on Office Online. While we do watch this blog, we are always listening on Office Online and do use your feedback to try to improve your experience, as part of our daily business. You can give us general feedback about Access Help, including topics that are not well-covered, by clicking the Send Us Your Comments link (office.microsoft.com/.../redir.aspx) on the Access Help home page (office.microsoft.com/.../FX100646911033.aspx). While it seems the problem that led you to make this post stems from not finding the article you need, if you do find a specific article lacking, please consider using the feedback mechnism at the bottom of that article to let us know what change you'd like to see. Again, thanks very much for this feedback, and be assured that we are considering it and trying to address it as best we can.

Thank you OfficeOnline for your response. I have indeed sent comments in the feedback system at the bottom of some help articles and am glad to think that they at least make it to you guys. However, I really don't have time to enter comments for every deficiency that I come across in the help system. I'm not trying to be antagonistic in saying that...it is just the reality. While I think its really good that users can give feedback right there within the help system (in fact, it's excellent), I don't think users should have to do basic quality control that should be done by Microsoft, a company that prides itself (quite rightly) on producing high quality products.