1. < database > A relational database running under Microsoft Windows . Data is stored as a number of " tables ", e.g. "Stock". Each table consists of a number of " records " (e.g. for different items) and each record contains a number of " fields ", e.g. "Product code", "Supplier", "Quantity in stock".
Access allows the user to create " forms " and "reports". A form shows one record in a user-designed format and allows the user to step through records one at a time. A report shows selected records in a user-designed format, possibly grouped into sections with different kinds of total (including sum, minimum, maximum, average).
There are also facilities to use links (" joins ") between tables which share a common field and to filter records according to certain criteria or search for particular field values.
Version: 2 (date?).
Usenet newsgroup: news:comp.databases.ms-access .
2. A communications program from Microsoft, meant to compete with ProComm and other programs. It sucked and was dropped. Years later they reused the name for their database.
[Date?]
(1997-07-20)