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What you will do

In this project you will use Microsoft Access 2007, 2010, 2013, or 2016 to create a simple database with two tables, one query, one form, and one report.  Not a typical database!

You will use some of the wizards that Microsoft Access includes to help you get started. The wizards are only a starting point! They save you a lot of time when you are first learning how to create the parts of a database. You will usually want to make changes, however, to get what you really want.

The example databases are in your resource files , if you would like to open them to see them at work.

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Microsoft Access Limits

There have to be limits to the number and size of many things about MS Access. The limits are fairly generous, but, of course, there are always situations that exceed any limit you care to pick! Below is a table of some of the limits you might run into.

Feature:	Limit:
Total size of database	2 Gigabytes including space needed for system objects that the database requires
Number of objects	32,768 Total of all tables, queries, forms, reports, indices, etc. It's hard to count up the number of indices!
Characters in name of table or field	64
Characters in a user name	20
Characters in a password	14
Number of concurrent users	255 people at once
Fields in a table	255
Open tables	2048 including internal tables opened by Microsoft Access
Characters in a text field Called Short Text field in Access 2013 and 2016	255
Characters in a memo field. Called a Long Text field in Access 2013 and 2016	65,535 when entered through user interface. 1 gigabyte if entered programmatically Access 201, 2016: 1 GB either way
Size of OLE object	1 gigabyte This might be a photo or spreadsheet or Word document
Tables in a query	32
Fields in a recordset	255
Sort limit	255 characters in 1 or more fields
Levels of nested queries	50
Characters in a label in form or report	2048
Characters in text box	65535
Form or report width	22.75 in. (57.79 cm)
Section height in form or report	22.75 in. (57.79 cm)
Number of levels of nested forms or reports	7
Number of printed pages in report	65535

There are more limits than these! Specifications and limits seem to be the same:
MS Access 2007
MS Access 2010 and 2013
MS Access 2016

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Real World Limits

Your database may suffer from serious sluggishness long before it reaches the maximum size. The larger the database, the more important good design and good indexing become. Otherwise, the simplest action can take a long time to perform.

While there is no limit to the number of records in a table, the whole database has to fit inside 2 Gigabytes of space. How many records you can squeeze in will depend on how much data goes with each record.

When your database gets close to the maximum for any of the limits, it's time to think about switching to a more advanced database program.

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Advanced Features

As you look through the Help files or searching online for information about Access, you will see references things that are not Access desktop databases. These have different features, limits, and methods than Access databases. It can be quite confusing.

• Access Project

  An Access project is, according to the Access Help files: "An Access file that connects to a Microsoft SQL Server database and is used to create client/server applications. A project file doesn't contain any data or data-definition-based objects such as tables and views."

  This feature is not available in Access 2013 or 2016.

• Access Web Databases

  This feature was new with Access 2010. It allowed you to create web databases that were published on a SharePoint site. This allowed users to view and add or modify records over an Internet connection.

  This feature is not available in Access 2013 or 2016.

• Access Web App

  New with Access 2013, an Access Web App is a database that you use in a browser while storing the data and the database on an SQL server. You must create the app using Access 2013 or later. This replaces the web database feature that was in Access 2010. You share your database using SharePoint 2013, Office 365 Small Business, or Office 365 Enterprise.

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