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Migrating Access to SQL Server
Migrating your Access database to SQL Server requires planning. Here is an overview.
Xero API – Endpoints
Passsing data to or from Xero is done by first specifying an endpoint (EP). EPs roughly translate to tables but each EP can involve more than one table. For example a response from the Invoices EP can also give you aggregated totals for Payments and Credit Notes applied to each invoice. Your API call can… Read More »
Xero API – Invoices
I’m currently working on an interface between an Application built using MS Access and the Xero Accounting application using Xero’s API. It’s a seriously large application not some dinky little Access app. Xero are moving to oAuth 2.0 authentification. The deprecation of oAuth 1.0, which used Open-SSL for authentification, has presented some challenges. With 2.0… Read More »
Managing Application Updates
Test and Release Each client has a person responsible for testing and then releasing new versions – The Client’s Project (or Application) Manager This is important as it ensures that a) the Client has the opportunity to test in their environment for critical use cases before THEY release b) they share responsibility for any issues… Read More »
What We Do
Custom Software Solutions for Your Business Designed to Run Your Business the way you want it run. When you can’t find, or don’t want an “Out of the Box” solution telling you how to run Your Business. With 30 years of experience running and advising business as a Business Analyst and Project Manager and 25 years… Read More »
Table Types
To my way of thinking, there are two types of tables. Entity Tables and Transaction Tables. It is important to understand the difference. Entity Describes an entity and its attributes. Customers are entities, Products are entities. You can edit an entity’s attributes. I always like to use a Log table that takes a copy of… Read More »
Outer Joins in Access
The Access Query Designer does some great stuff but what it won’t do is an Outer Join. What is an Outer Join? If we have two tables, in this example Sales and Orders and we want to see a full list of customers who have placed Either an Order or a Sale and also see… Read More »
Application Install Guide
In its simplest form, an Access Application, or indeed any database application is made up of two components, Data and User Interface (UI). This is referred to as a Client Server architecture where the Data, otherwise known as the Backend (BE), is situated on a Server where it can be shared by all users (although… Read More »
Normalisation
A relational database allows you to ‘normalise’ your data. Normalising data means that you only have to store repeated information in one place. For example, if you are storing invoice data then each invoice for the same Customer does not need to store the address of the customer, this is held in a Customer table… Read More »
Why Access
Microsoft Access provides two main functions. Firstly it is a database container, capable of storing your data. Secondly it is an application development tool which enables you to create forms and reports that make use of your data by presenting it to the user. In fact Access is considered a Rapid Application Development (RAD) tool. It’s… Read More »
Containers, Collections and Objects
An Access Database is a container. Within this container are collections of objects which include tables, queries, forms and reports. Objects can themselves be containers. For example a table contains columns (or fields) while forms and reports contain controls that display data. So we could iterate through our database’s Tables (TableDefs) and through each Table’s Fields like this… Read More »
Naming Conventions
When Naming Objects, The first purpose of Naming Conventions is to ensure that the names of objects are unique. Access may allow you to give the same name as a table to a form or report (but not a query) but that doesn’t mean you should. At some point you may need to rename an object… Read More »
Requerying Combo and List Boxes
If you add, or edit, records in a Form then any Combo or List box based on that form’s Datasource is no longer up to date. I’ve seen many attempts to handle this and most are very clunky, others difficult to maintain. What we should be doing is requerying all the Lists in our Application when,… Read More »
The Software Development Life Cycle
The Software Development Life Cycle outlines the process for successful software development. The concepts of SDLC are part of Project Management, regardless of what PM strategy you use. This cycle may be a day or a year but in its most simplified form The Cycle looks like – Specify > Develop > Test and Document >… Read More »