I just HATE Access 2007

[DCrake]

I think the title says it all.

Here's the jist, Have written this program in 2003 works perfectly. see first pic

When I launch it in 2007 it says it cannot find my custom menu, even though it recognises it in properties. see 2nd pic

If I then do a compact and Repair it finds it and runs ok. see pic 3

however the menu seems to be missing. see pic 4

Why does A2007 have that much issue with custom menus. I have followed all instructions from everyone but cannot get it work in both versions the same.


I have just copied everything into a blank mdb and got the same results.


I thought it could be a naming issue so I renamed the menu, that did not make any difference.

Then I create a accdb and imported everything into it - including the menus. Then went to Access options for this database end the menu is not available for selection even though it comes up under addins.

I seem to have run out of things to try.

It may be I will have to tell my client that the new version will not run under 2007 unless I do away with the custom menu. But that was the first item on his wish list with the new rewrite.


Just to cap it all I never mentioned that you cannot modify a custom menu in 2007, so if any changes need to be done they have to done in 2003 and then imported into 2007. Does it get any worse.

Very very frustrated.


David

 

[Lightwave]

Its my impression from here and other content that I've read that Access 2007 is not well liked by developers. Not just that but its getting the vista (best avoided wait for something better next time ) treatment

I just looked at purchase of standalone program 2003 vs 2007 and Access 2003 is twice as expensive as Access 2007 ( one off comparison might be wrong )

Now that tells me that they're finding it a lot harder to shift product.

I will guess I'll get a copy and try and run some of my solutions on them but if they don't work and I have to do major work on them.. Could take me months of work to get back to same level - might never manage it!

Good luck DCrake - its worrying when one of the "proper" developers run into trouble it means its probably not that far off for me.

 

[Mr. B]

David,

I don't know if this will help at all or not, but it might>

Take a look at this link:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc178973.aspx
especially the section: "Features no longer available in Office Access 2007"

It talks about one way to have your custome menus work in Access 2007.

I really think that Microsoft intended that we should make new Ribbon menus to replace our cutom menus that we already have, but then, thay don't have to do all the work.

 

[georgedwilkinson]

Agreed...the 2007 suite generally sucks. From a productivity standpoint, it takes many more clicks/keystrokes to do common jobs as it does in 2003 and below. I don't see anything that makes up for that.

 

[boblarson]

Agreed...the 2007 suite generally sucks.

And I'm one who will disagree. I love it.

From a productivity standpoint, it takes many more clicks/keystrokes to do common jobs as it does in 2003 and below.

I'd like to see some actual evidence of that because they created this in order to change that and it has not been my experience that there are any more keystrokes or clicks to do the same things. They are DIFFERENT clicks or keystrokes, and you can use the keyboard shortcuts just like in versions past. So, how about ponying up some examples of a common task that takes more keystrokes or clicks to accomplish - specifically with steps.

 

[Banana]

Personally, I'm pretty meh about 2007. It doesn't feel quite compelling to me, unlike 2010 which has features I can look forward to.

With ribbon, one interesting aspect is that it's easy to customize the ribbon- you write out XML file and throw it in USysRibbons, and you get your own custom menu. While 2003 & earlier certainly was easier to build the menu WYSIWYG-ially, re-importing & re-customizing them were quite painful whereas at least having a XML file makes it easier to reuse the customization. This is despite me loathing XML (too verbose! everyone want to use it everywhere! bleech!), and I really wish I could customize the ribbon to reduce itself to only 1/3 of the size and throw in the standard menu.

There's also the option to not use ribbons at all and define your own menus. I'm of two minds on this. As much as I dislike ribbons, consistency is important and if users has been accustomed to the ribbon in other Office applications and doesn't see it in the Access application and refuse to use it or at least doesn't use it as they should be, then that put in me in a bad spot. I suppose that's one thing I'll just leave up to the customer to decide what they want.

As for actually using the ribbons? Well... I haven't actually counted the clicks but I do know I hate it when ribbons try to "guess" what tab I want to be looking. Open up an action query in design view, click Run button, then go to the table and see the changes, return to the query. Ribbon is no longer on the Query Design tab but rather on the Home tab. Why? I don't need anything in Home. So that's one wasted click. This is just one example but it does happen in other circumstances that i have to make a habit of clicking on the right tab when I change the gears in my workflow.

IMHO, this was the best site discussing about 2007 ribbons and customization. David, see if FAQ has something to help you out, unless you've already seen it.

I can't help wonder, as well, why the WYSIWYG editor was tossed out when it continues to support custom menus just fine (well, in theory anyway). I suppose the rationale is to encourage people to not create menus anymore and use ribbons, but that's kind of wrong way to do it, I think. I mean, if they really thought ribbons were that great idea, users would be spontaneously flocking to it without needing prodding from Microsoft, surely?

Oh, one thing to think about. In 2007, they threw out the menus, right? Had that Office button. In 2010, the good ol' "File" is actually back. Why? Seems to me that they realized that it wasn't such a hot idea to throw out the familiar "File".

So in short, I use ribbons only because I have to and not by choice. If I buy next version of Office for my personal use, it'll probably be 2011. Why? No ribbon. Of course, it won't come with Access, which is what I do my work, so thus I must put up with it. I continue to believe that ribbons was invented for sake of change and not because it was truly better. At best, it's not worse than the cluttered mess they had in 2003 & earlier, just different and that's not saying much, I'm sorry to say.

 

[georgedwilkinson]

And I'm one who will disagree. I love it.


I'd like to see some actual evidence of that because they created this in order to change that and it has not been my experience that there are any more keystrokes or clicks to do the same things. They are DIFFERENT clicks or keystrokes, and you can use the keyboard shortcuts just like in versions past. So, how about ponying up some examples of a common task that takes more keystrokes or clicks to accomplish - specifically with steps.

Dang dude, it's already too much work to try to figure out how to use it...now you want me to document that it's unusable?

I'll get right on that!

 

[boblarson]

I use it all of the time and have no issues. At first it was hard finding things but I guess because I have a different frame of mind around it - I didn't come out adversarial with it to begin with and expected a learning curve. Now I use it and am looking forward to our conversion here at work, which I was hoping to do this month but it looks like we'll have to wait until after March due to another project.

 

[georgedwilkinson]

Sorry I don't have Word 2003 here to compare it to, but I believe it is MUCH easier to zoom to text width in 2003. In 2007:
View|Zoom|Text Width|Ok

with a lot of non-linear mouse movements.

 

[ajetrumpet]

Agreed...the 2007 suite generally sucks. From a productivity standpoint, it takes many more clicks/keystrokes to do common jobs as it does in 2003 and below. I don't see anything that makes up for that.

makes you wonder if 2010 will be any easier doesn't it george?

 

[boblarson]

2010 actually IS easier (as they've done away with SOME of 2007's annoyances). But, the Ribbon is still here and likely here to stay (at least for the foreseeable future).

 

[ajetrumpet]

in my view there is nothing wrong with version 7, but the ribbon i think is an annoyance because the menu bar was there for sooooooooooo long before that, people have a hard time adjusting. but i'll tell you something else, MS's persistance to push people to using their new software by eliminating access to older software tools has really ticked me off. When people tell me that they are still using ver 97, i laugh because i know they're screwed if they want to do anything worth while with it. as far as MS is concerned, they didn't even create that program!

 

[boblarson]

I don't know if you've tried to support an older version of your own program and make it work on all of the later Operating Systems, fix bugs, etc. but I have and it can be resource intensive. So, I have no qualms with them ending support for a version, as long as users can keep using it. But, it is at their own risk that it will work on later operating systems and all. But it makes no sense from a financial standpoint to continue to support something once it gets past a certain age. Now, granted, I would say that most people would argue that the age MS has determined is too young, but it is what it is and you have to go into things knowing that at some point you will either need to keep your old hardware and old software to do what it does, or you have to upgrade and upgrading one or the other usually means upgrading both.

 

[ajetrumpet]

what technology are you using to post to this forum when you're not even here Bob? That must be advanced.

 

[boblarson]

what technology are you using to post to this forum when you're not even here Bob? That must be advanced.

I COULD be using AccessMonster like Missinglinq does. But I'm not, I am currently turned Off for visibility as I had set it last night and forgot to reset it this morning.

 

[Banana]

2010 actually IS easier (as they've done away with SOME of 2007's annoyances). But, the Ribbon is still here and likely here to stay (at least for the foreseeable future).

I'm inclined to agree. I've already mentioned the File's return and there's some changes to the File menu... they now call it "Backstage" and it does seem to work well. I haven't used 2007 long enough to say whether the ribbon itself has improved, though.

However, one piece by far impressed me even though I was quite against the idea of it at the start- macro editor.

They did pretty good job with the macro editors and in some respect, it's quicker than writing out VBA code (fewer keystrokes and more intellisense-assited = blazing speed). This isn't to say I would want to give up VBA (gah, it's quite long in tooth....) but for web stuff and data macros where there is no alternatives, it's actually much more workable than the old macro editors and for that I'm happy.

 

[Galaxiom]

Sorry I don't have Word 2003 here to compare it to, but I believe it is MUCH easier to zoom to text width in 2003. In 2007:
View|Zoom|Text Width|Ok

Or you could just use the very convenient zoom slider at the bottom of the window.

One click zoom to page width is there on the View Ribbon. Is your monitor really so small that you can't handle including the margins? I would recommend you upgrade your monitor.

If you really want zoom to text width you could add it to the Quick Access Toolbar.

I would never choose to return to the earlier versions of Office.

 

[ajetrumpet]

I COULD be using AccessMonster like Missinglinq does. But I'm not, I am currently turned Off for visibility as I had set it last night and forgot to reset it this morning.

and im' NOT a moderator, so I can't SEE that you're invisible. I have anger issues, remember? lol

 

[boblarson]

and im' NOT a moderator, so I can't SEE that you're invisible. I have anger issues, remember? lol

Why do you think I hide

 

[Avelino]

Hello david

See the changes in your CustomMenu.mdb

1) see img1.gif of updates to kernel startup

2) I created the AutoExec macro calling the function fncLoadMenu ()

3) see the function in the module "modMenu"

4) see the changes in the form frmMain

good, I have hit this time (laughs)

success