Databases store data well when properly designed. But storing data is not the ends for maintaining a database. We want to use the data. Sometimes we need to do a quick search through the data to answer a general question. For example, we may be asked what is John Doe’s phone number.
We could build a query and set the criteria block to the last name of Doe and the first name of John and execute the query. Based on the query results you will get your answer. But that method will take more work that simply using the quick search features on the Access Home Menu in the Sort & Filter Section.
To use this Sort & Filter section simply open the data edit form for the records you’d like to search and position the cursor in the field you’d like to search through. Once this is done the Sort & Filter section will be enabled.
Fig. 1 – Sort & Filter Section of Home Ribbon
To sort the records alphabetically from A to Z in the field selected simply click the Ascending option. The inverse is also true by clicking the Descending option. These options are a terrific way to simply order the records by a field for a quick look.
The Selection option is a little more robust. It will allow the user to look for a specific value or set of values based on criteria selected.
Fig. 2 – Selection option
The Selection option is also data type specific. So, for date type data the options will be On, On or Before, On or After, and Between (inclusive between two dates). Numeric data will also have a different data-centric set of search options.
Another nice feature of this search method is that once a set of records have been found you can go through the process again to further refine the set of data. So, once you’ve restricted the set to John Does you can then restrict the set further to John Does in the State of AR.
To return to the original record set of the form simply click the Toggle Filter option. The record set will be restored without filters.
While this method of searching records is not as detailed as a query it is very quick to retrieve records for a general view of the set and further refinement of set results.
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