Tuesday, October 30, 2007

MS ACCESS - Input mask syntax and examples

Many people struggle with input mask special characters so here is the help file from MS Access:

Valid input mask characters

Microsoft Access interprets characters in the InputMask property definition as shown in the following table. To define a literal character, enter any character other than those shown in the table, including spaces and symbols. To define one of the following characters as a literal character, precede that character with a backslash (\).

Character Description
0 Digit (0 through 9, entry required; plus [+] and minus [-] signs not allowed).
9 Digit or space (entry not required; plus and minus signs not allowed).
# Digit or space (entry not required; blank positions converted to spaces, plus and minus signs allowed).
L Letter (A through Z, entry required).
? Letter (A through Z, entry optional).
A Letter or digit (entry required).
a Letter or digit (entry optional).
& Any character or a space (entry required).
C Any character or a space (entry optional).
. , : ; - / Decimal placeholder and thousands, date, and time separators.
(The actual character used depends on the regional settings
< Causes all characters that follow to be converted to lowercase.
> Causes all characters that follow to be converted to uppercase.
! Causes the input mask (input mask: A format that consists of literal display characters (such as parentheses, periods, and hyphens) and mask characters that specify where data is to be entered as well as what kind of data and how many characters are allowed.) to display from right to left, rather than from left to right. Characters typed into the mask always fill it from left to right. You can include the exclamation point anywhere in the input mask.
\ Causes the character that follows to be displayed as a literal character. Used to display any of the characters listed in this table as literal characters (for example, \A is displayed as just A).

Password
Setting the InputMask property to the word Password creates a password entry text box. Any character typed in the text box is stored as the character but is displayed as an asterisk (*).
Input mask examples
The following table shows some useful input mask (input mask: A format that consists of literal display characters (such as parentheses, periods, and hyphens) and mask characters that specify where data is to be entered as well as what kind of data and how many characters are allowed.) definitions and examples of values you can enter into them.
Input mask definition

Examples of values
(000) 000-0000
(206) 555-0248

(999) 999-9999!
(206) 555-0248
( ) 555-0248

(000) AAA-AAAA
(206) 555-TELE

#999
-20
2000

>L????L?000L0
GREENGR339M3
MAY R 452B7

>L0L 0L0
T2F 8M4

00000-9999
98115-
98115-3007

>LMaria
Pierre

ISBN 0-&&&&&&&&&-0
ISBN 1-55615-507-7
ISBN 0-13-964262-5

>LL00000-0000
DB51392-0493

Monday, October 29, 2007

Getting data into your Oulook Calendar from EXCEL !!!

I now use this to import my weekly/monthly calendar data across into my Outlook Calendar at home to keep me up to date with my latest whereababouts, thanks to Allister for the loan of this information .....

Wednesday, May 11, 2005 3:35 PM by Allister_Frost


Another handy way to add appointments to your calendar is by importing from Excel. To do this you first need to create an Excel file containing the appointment information Outlook needs. Your first row should contain columns titles which match Outlook's appointment fields. You don't need many fields to get started, just try the following for a basic import of all day appointments:

Cell A1: Subject
Cell B1: Start Date

Now add the data you'd like to import into your Outlook calendar under each of these column headings, for example: cell A2 could be "Bob's Birthday" and cell B2 could be "11/05/2005"
Now, here's the important bit. Highlight the entire range of cells that you've used (in my example this would be A1:B2) and give this range a name under Insert, Name, Define (or just type into the Name Box just above the top of column A). Outlook needs this range name so it knows where to find the data to import. Save your Excel file and close it.

Now just pop into Outlook and choose File, Import and Export. Then select Import from another program or file, hit Next, then choose Microsoft Excel and hit Next again. Now locate the Excel file you created earlier, hit Next, select your Calendar, press Next again and check that Outlook finds the correct Range Name in your Excel file. Now press Map Custom Fields to verify how Outlook is mapping your Excel column headers to its own Calendar Appointment fields, changing if necessary, then hit OK, then Finish.

If you've done everything right, your Outlook Calendar will now contain the appointments you created in Excel.

There are 22 fields you can import into Outlook in this way. These are: Subject, Start Date, Start Time, End Date, End Time, All day event, Reminder on/off, Reminder Date, Reminder Time, Meeting Organizer, Required Attendees, Optional Attendees, Meeting Resources, Billing Information, Categories, Description, Location, Mileage, Priority, Private, Sensitivity, Show time as.

Top tip: try importing in this way to your Task folder rather than your Calendar. This is a great way to move a list of 'to do' items from Excel or Project directly into your Outlook calendar.

Monday, October 22, 2007

SQL Query Criteria

Hi all,
See this link below for the Microsoft guide to Query criteria and SQL commands :

http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/access/HP051885161033.aspx?pid=CH063608261033

Thanks

Jamie

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Jamie Johnson
JJSurf IT Training Ltd
http://www.jjsurf.co.uk/