Week in Review: April 6, 2024

Just Published

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

Articles

• Juan Soto (Access Experts)

  • Breaking News: Access and Excel to Merge in 2024, Introducing “AccXel”!, published April 1, 2024

• Crystal Long (Access Access Newsletter)

  • Make Access Tab Control Pages come alive

• Daniel Pineault (DEVelopers HUT)

  • Microsoft – You Have Been Blocked!
  • Microsoft Access Roadmap – April 2024 Review
  • Modern Web Browser Control Initially Displaying Blank Page
  • New Microsoft Access Modern SQL Editor Released!
  • Modern Web Browser Control Leaving Hidden Processes
  • AutoResize List Box and Combo Box Columns Based On The Content
  • Smart Indenter Is Alive

• Colin Riddington (Isladogs on Access)

  • Highlight Control/Column in Continuous Forms
  • Rounded Corners in Forms

• Mike Wolfe (NoLongerSet)

  • Boost Efficiency by Documenting Recurring Processes in ProcessKit
  • Access NewsCast with Karl Donaubauer: Episode 8
  • FileIsOpen(): Check If Another User or Process Has a File Locked
  • QuickTip: Reproducible SELECT Results

Videos‌

• Colin Riddington [Isladogs] (YouTube channel)

  • Highlight Selected Control or Column in Continuous Forms (04:58)
  • Rounded Corners in Forms (05:47)

• Karl Donaubauer (YouTube channel)

  • Access News 8 (20:49): March 2024

• George Hepworth (YouTube channel)

  • "Wait For It..." (07:26): Immediate or Deferred Search Execution. Your Application, Your Choice
  • Classic Client-Server Design for PowerApps (19:05): My (somewhat belated) Return to Classic Client-Server Design for PowerApps applications

• Sean MacKenzie (YouTube channel)

  • How to Query Big Data with MS Access (19:18): How to Query Big Data with MS Access

• Richard Rost (YouTube channel)

  • Eclipse Timer: Part 1 (20:07): Build an Interactive Real-Time Eclipse Timer in Microsoft Access, Part 1
  • Eclipse Timer: Part 2 (17:21): Build an Interactive Real-Time Eclipse Timer in Microsoft Access, Part 2
  • Eclipse Timer: Part 3 (24:01): Build an Interactive Real-Time Eclipse Timer in Microsoft Access, Part 3
  • Custom Date Picker: Part 1 (16:04): How to Build a Custom Date Picker Popup Form in Microsoft Access
  • Custom Date Picker: Part 2 (16:47): How to Build a Custom Date Picker Popup Form in Microsoft Access, Part 2

• Daniel Pineault (YouTube channel)

  • VBA - Determine if a font is installed (07:53)
  • Modern Web Browser control - Blank - Current Event Bug (09:12)

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 9, 2024: UK Access User Group - April 2024 Conference - in-person Access conference at Imperial College, London
• April 16, 2024: Juan Soto - Managing SQL Server Migration Projects  (JUST ADDED)
• 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
• May 1, 2024: Adolph Dupré - Using  VBA to create a class based on a table (NEW DATE)
• 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: Colin Riddington - View & Edit Import/Export (IMEX) Data Task Specifications (NEW DATE)
• 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 (2024-03-30) and this one (2024-04-06).

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