About.com Rating

The Bottom Line

Zac Woodall's book provides an excellent introduction to creating and sharing Microsoft Access database templates. It's a wonderful reference for anyone who needs to occasionally or regularly design or develop Access templates.



Pros

• Straight from the source -- written by the Microsoft Access program manager
• Well-written with an easy-to-read style
• Bonus chapter and code/templates available for download online

• Provides insights into Access design decisions

Cons

• Coverage focused on Access templates; not a complete Access reference

Description

• Illustrated examples with great explanatory text
• Friendly, conversational book accessible to Access newbies
• Supplemented by online materials to enhance your learning experience

Guide Review - The Rational Guide to Microsoft Office Access 2007 Templates

The Rational Guide to Microsoft Office Access 2007 Templates is a well-written, easy read. It's one of those rare technical books that you can pick up and read from cover-to-cover without the assistance of a pot of strong coffee. Zac Woodall's done a great job of sharing knowledge about Access tempates in a friendly, conversational style.

Zac is the Access Program Manager at Microsoft and, from this position, offers unique insight into the Access development process. For example, in the chapter discussing the ACCDT file format, Zac explains the rationale used by the team when they decided to create a new file type for Access templates.

The book covers the following topics:

• Introducing Access 2007 Templates
• The ACCDT File Format
• How Templates Are Used
• Creating a Basic Template
• Deciding to Build a Template
• Refined Application Experiences
• User-Customizable Applications
• Controlling User Experiences
• Personalization
• Design for SharePoint
• Branding
• Template Security
• Sharing Templates
• Template File Anatomy
• Template Collections
• Enterprise Template Deployment
• Generating Templates without Running Access
• Integrating Templates with Add-Ins