Week in Review: March 30, 2024

Just Published

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

Articles

• Official Access Blog

  • Access Releases 9 Issue Fixes in Version 2401 and Version 2402 (Released Jan 30 and Feb 28, 2024), by Linda Lu Cannon

• Access Forever

  • Access DevCon 2024, Agenda + Schedule, by Karl Donaubauer

• a.p.r. pillai (Learn MS-Access Tips and Tricks)

  • Streamline Zoom-in Control Data Editing

• Mathieu Guindon (Rubberduck VBA)

  • RD3 March 2024

• Daniel Pineault (DEVelopers HUT)

  • How To Determine If A Font Exists
  • How To Sanitize A Filename
  • Determine If A Filename Is Valid
  • Microsoft Word Bug – Character Count Is Wrong
  • Microsoft Word Bug – Words Count Is Wrong
  • Counting the Number of Words in a String
  • How To Count The Number Of Characters In A String

• Colin Riddington (Isladogs on Access)

  • View/Edit IMEX Data Task Specifications
  • Click Me And I Disappear!
  • Lock Down Database Objects
  • AEU28: View & Edit IMEX Data Task Specifications
  • AEU27: Use VBA to create a class based on a table

• Crystal Long (Ms Access Gurus | Access Access Newsletter)

  • Download files and video link for 'Tab Control, Unicode, and Format' presentation

• Mike Wolfe (NoLongerSet)

  • KeePass: The Ideal Combination of Security and Convenience
  • AutoKeys: One of Access's Most Well-Hidden Secrets
  • DokuWiki: A Versatile Tool for Developer and End-User Documentation
  • Refactoring Procedure Signatures: The Do's and Don'ts
  • What is a Procedure Signature?

Videos‌

• Colin Riddington [Isladogs] (YouTube channel)

  • Move & Resize Borderless Form Using Mouse Events (07:03)
  • Click Me and I Disappear (02:28): (Hide Control With Focus)

• Richard Rost (YouTube channel)

  • Microsoft Access Quick Queries #15 (24:39): Updating Backends, Access Memory Leaks, Referential Integrity...
  • Overflow! (28:57): The Overflow Error in Microsoft Access. What is it? What Causes it? How to Fix it!
  • Log Changes to Table (19:14): Log Changes Made to Data in Microsoft Access at the Table Level Using a Data Macro
  • Where Are The Links? (01:53): Finding the Description Section Under YouTube Videos
  • AI Chef Helper, Part 1 (18:36): Integrate OpenAI (ChatGPT) for Recipe Ideas into the Microsoft Access Chef's Kitchen Helper
  • AI Chef Helper, Part 2 (18:31): Integrate OpenAI (ChatGPT) for Recipe Ideas into the Microsoft Access Chef's Kitchen Helper, Part 2

• Edcelle John Gulfan (YouTube channel)

  • SEARCH FORM (12:46): Searching while Typing in Microsoft Access.

New to Me

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

Nothing new this week.

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.}

• April 3, 2024: Dale Fye - Working with Command Bars and the Access Shortcut Tool
• April 04, 2024: Kent Gorrell - SQL Server Audit Tables  (JUST ADDED)
• April 9, 2024: UK Access User Group - April 2024 Conference - in-person Access conference at Imperial College, London
• April 18-19, 2024: Access DevCon Vienna - (Online in Microsoft Teams) Agenda available here
• April 30, 2024: Jim Dettman and Doug Yudovich - Learn how to chat with other Access developers on Discord  (JUST ADDED)
• May 1, 2024: Colin Riddington - View & Edit Import/Export (IMEX) Data Task Specifications
• May 2, 2024: Tom van Stiphout and Kim Young- Developing Solid Applications
• May 28, 2024: George Young- Using Web APIs in Access
• June 05, 2024: Adolph Dupré - Creating Classes from tables
• July 03, 2024: Olaf Nöhring - Getting Attention with style: An Improved, Enhanced Message Box
• September 04, 2024: Aleksander Wojtasz - Follow-up session on Interactive Gantt charts
• October 02, 2024: Alessandro Grimaldi - Animation with Style in Access
• November 06, 2024: Chris Arnold - Tips and Tricks for Continuous Forms

Access Roadmap

There were NO CHANGES to the roadmap between the last Week in Review (2024-03-23) and this one (2024-03-30).

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