Commentary Priorities and Time Management for Microsoft Access Consultants Whether you realize it or not, every decision you make about how to manage your time is a result of what you prioritize.
Commentary The Rule of Thrice: Know When to Build Generic Solutions in Code Once is a fluke. Twice is a coincidence. Thrice is a pattern.
Commentary VBA Cracks RedMonk's Stack Overflow Top 15 for 2023 VBA may never be a GitHub heavyweight, but it holds its own among other top languages in terms of Stack Overflow popularity.
Commentary Documentation-First Development The act of writing end-user documentation before software development offers a host of surprising benefits.
Commentary AI is the Future...And the Future is Now Used properly, AI is the greatest force-multiplying technology the world has ever seen.
Commentary Spinning Plates: What this Parlor Trick Has in Common with Software Development The fewer items you need to mentally track the less likely you are to make mistakes or generate bugs.
Commentary The Zen of Python: 19 Pieces of Programming Wisdom The Zen of Python is the famous philosophical foundation of one of the world's most popular programming languages. And that's no coincidence.
Commentary The 5 Surprising Lessons I Learned About Developing Software Many of the things I thought I knew about writing software were not only wrong, but often the exact opposite of the truth.
Commentary Managing Software Complexity: The Rule of Seven Don't try to increase the number of balls you can keep in the air; instead, reduce the number of balls needed to follow your software's logic.
Commentary How to Know When to Turn Lines of Code Into a Standalone Routine in VBA DRY vs. YAGNI. Don't Repeat Yourself or You Ain't Gonna Need It? Sometimes it's not obvious whether a block of code would be useful as a standalone routine.
Intermediate Karl's Catalog: A Checklist of Access Best Practices Karl Donaubauer's checklist of Microsoft Access best practices offers a wealth of information to beginners and professional developers alike.
Commentary Follow-Up: Avoiding Context Switching It doesn't matter which context you are working in–VBA or queries–the key is to pick one and stick with it.
Commentary The Problems with Boilerplate Code Copy. Paste. Modify. Repeat. Writing and maintaining boilerplate code is a necessary evil in VBA.
Commentary Avoid Context Switching for More Readable Code Writing code is like juggling. But mixing code, queries, and global state is like juggling balls, bowling pins, and running chainsaws.
Commentary PICNIC: The Underlying Cause of Many Technical Support Calls A PICNIC is the most frequent source of problems on technical support calls.
Commentary The Curse of Knowledge Even the world's worst programmer knows more about programming than most small business owners or department managers.
Commentary Expect the Unexpected Getting ready to start a complex project? Stressing about what might go wrong? Here's some advice to help lower that stress level.
Commentary Yes, VBA-Enabled Office Docs are a Significant Threat VBA-enabled documents are commonly used to open the door for more virulent malware.
Commentary Is Microsoft Access a Good Development Platform in 2022? Microsoft has embraced the mantra of "move fast and break things." For Access, though, Microsoft is only delivering on the latter part of that promise.
Commentary Code is WORM: Act Accordingly Write Once. Read Many. The cost of avoiding shortcuts when writing code is far exceeded by the benefits you'll get when reading it.
Whiteboard Sessions The Knowledge Square For knowledge workers in the 21st century, it's better to know what question to ask than it is to know the answer to the question.
Advanced The Microsoft Access Ternary Operator It's a function. It's a statement. It's an operator. It's a--what the heck do we call this short-circuit-evaluating IIf() thing and why does it even matter?
Commentary The State of Access Today What's the state of Microsoft Access in 2021: thriving, alive, dying, or dead? If you only know Access by reputation, the answer may surprise you.
Commentary The Key to Navigating Unfamiliar Territory Without a Map How I successfully led a 60-vehicle military convoy at 23 years old without knowing what I was doing or where I was going.
Risk Management Cowpathing with Microsoft Access How do you decide where to spend your software development dollars? Don't guess what your users need, let them show you with Access.