0Microsoft Access has been around for some time, yet people often still ask me what is Microsoft Access and what does it do? Microsoft Access is a part of the Microsoft Office Suite. It does not come with all versions of Microsoft Office, so if you specifically want Microsoft Access make sure the office suite you are purchasing has it.
Microsoft Access has the look and feel of other Microsoft Office products, including its layout and navigational aspects. That is where the similarity ends. Microsoft® Access is a database and, more specifically, a relational database. This will be explained in more detail later.
Access has an .mdb extension by default, whereas Microsoft® Word has the .doc extension. Although this has changed in Access 2007 where the extension is now an accdb extension. Early versions of Access cannot read accdb extensions but Microsoft Access 2007 can read and change earlier versions of Access. The above is a bried overview of what is Microsoft Access
The Microsoft® Access Database is made up of 7 major components:
- Tables;
- Relationships;
- Queries;
- Forms;
- Reports;
- Macros;
- Modules.
