Week in Review: December 2, 2023

Just Published

^{This section includes videos, articles, and interesting discussions from the past 7 days.}

Articles

• Official Access Blog

  • Access Releases 7 Issue Fixes in Version 2310 (Released October 25th, 2023), by Linda Lu Cannon

• Access Forever

  • UK Access User Group - Live Conference, by Colin Riddington
  • Open Queries Directly in SQL View, by Colin Riddington

• Crystal Long (Access Access Newsletter)

  • Download Everything

• Mathieu Guindon (Rubberduck VBA)

  • Rubberduck 2.5.91

• Colin Riddington (Isladogs on Access)

  • Locked and disabled control puzzle - Pg 1
  • Locked and disabled control puzzle - Pg 2 - SOLVED
  • Long Value Binary fields in System Tables
  • Large Address Awareness in 32-bit Access

• Mike Wolfe (NoLongerSet)

  • Microsoft Access has an Anemic Third-Party Ecosystem...But There is a Silver Lining
  • Access 101: UPDATE Query
  • NEW & IMPROVED: The "Unset" Enum Item
  • The Secret to Achieving Naming Bliss in VBA Class Modules
  • Bananas Bring Bad Luck on Boats

Videos‌

• Access User Group Recordings (YouTube channel)

  • 2 free tools: 1)List Access Objects 2)VBA Code Documenter, step-thru OpenBypass (01:03:32): with Crystal Long and Adrian Bell

• Richard Rost (YouTube channel)

  • Direct SQL View (08:52): New Feature in Microsoft Access 365: Open Queries Directly to SQL View (and in VBA too!)
  • Holiday Greeting Cards (38:24): Holiday Greeting Card Database for Microsoft Access. Christmas, Hanukah, Kwanzaa, etc. for 2023
  • Auto Center (17:23): How to Use the Auto Center Form Property in Microsoft Access and Why I Never Liked Using It Before
  • Custom MsgBox Part 3 (24:28): Create a Custom Dynamic MsgBox in Microsoft Access Using VBA. Part 3: Multiple Arguments
  • Custom MsgBox Part 4 (19:37): Create a Custom Dynamic MsgBox in Microsoft Access Using VBA. Part 4: Button Captions
  • Custom MsgBox Part 5 (17:14): Create a Custom Dynamic MsgBox in Microsoft Access Using VBA. Part 5: Third Button

• Daniel Pineault (YouTube channel)

  • Microsoft Access - New SQL View Option (05:12)

• Pharos Technology [Dr. Richard Hanson] (YouTube channel)

  • Counting Checkbox Fields (0:54): How to Tally Checkboxes in a Microsoft Access Table

New to Me

^{This section includes content I discovered this week that has been around for awhile.}

• Empathy in Code Modernization, by Julian Flaks

Upcoming Access User Group Events

^{NOTE: Only English-language user group meetings with scheduled guest speakers or topics are listed.  For a complete list of upcoming events, visit the Access User Group event calendar.}

• December 6, 2023: Mike Wolfe - Streamline Your Import/Export Spec Workflow with VBA Classes
• December 7, 2023: Crystal Long - Modify Word Document Properties with Access
• January 3, 2024: Ramachandran (A.P.R.) Pillai - Streamlining the Form Module Code in the standalone Class Module
• January 4, 2024: Kent Gorrell - The Power of Sub classes in Access VBA
• February 7, 2024: Carlos Quintero - Features of MZ-Tools to make you more productive with VBA
• March 6, 2024: Thomas Möller - Better Access Charts in the new Edge Browser Control
• April 3, 2024: Dale Fye - Working with Command Bars and the Access Shortcut Tool
• May 1, 2024: Colin Riddington - View & Edit Import/Export (IMEX) Data Task Specifications

‌

Access Roadmap

There were NO CHANGES to the roadmap between the last Week in Review (2023-11-25) and this one (2023-12-02).

The development priorities were last updated at the German-language AEK conference on October 14, 2023.

Listed below is a snapshot of the official Access Roadmap.

"In Development", "Rolling Out", and "Launched" are Microsoft terms that I pulled straight from the public roadmap.

"Development Priorities" do not appear on the Access Roadmap.  Instead, they get updated from time to time in official Access blog posts or Access engineering team presentations.  I'll include a link to the source of the current development priorities as they get updated.

Development Priorities

The items listed below reflect Microsoft's order of priority and were published in the following article, Microsoft's Plans for Access in the Next 6 Months.

The items are listed in priority order according to Principal Engineering Manager Dale Rector.  The "Expected Benefit" of each feature is shown in italics after the description of the feature itself.

New priorities added since the previous set of priorities are shown in bold below.  Dropped priorities are struck through.

1. Continued Focus on Monthly Issue Fixes: (Monthly Issue Fix Blog) Improved product quality and reliability
2. Access becomes Large Address Aware: Removal of key customer error issue
3. Dataverse export improvements: Make it easier and faster for admins to migrate their data to Dataverse
4. Large monitor support for forms: Improved support of Access on the latest hardware
5. Modern Chart Improvements: Expanded support for the most popular chart types and options
6. SQL Editor Improvements: Significantly improved SQL query editing experience
7. Inconsistent Database Error Fix

Special thanks to Karl Donaubauer for posting the updated priorities at AccessForever.org.

In Development

• NOV 2023: Making 32-bit Access Large Address Aware (LAA)

Rolling Out

None.

Launched

• APR 2023: Modern Web Browser Control
• MAR 2023: New Modern Web Browser Form Control