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Access Tutorial Part 3
Querying your Data
To complete this lab, follow the steps outlined in the “Logging into Lynda.com” page in myClasses. Please watch the Access 2013
Essential Training with Adam Wilbert and then, practice your Access skills to create a simple database. Follow the steps below to
complete.
SET UP: As a starting point, you should have completed part 1 and 2 in completion. These steps will not work if your database is not
setup correctly.
CREATING A BASIC SELECT QUERY: Queries are for asking questions of the data. The first query you will create is designed to answer
the question “How many customers do you have in Delaware?” To answer this question, we will create a custom query, which pulls
copies of data that you specify from tables or other queries. Later in this tutorial, I’ll show you a very efficient way to do this, but for
now, we will create a simple Select query, sort the records by state, and manually count the number of customers.
1. Click on the Create ribbon and then click on the Query Design button.
2. This will open a blank query, and launch the Show Table box, which lets you add
tables and other queries to your new query design. Because the customer
location information is stored in the Customers table, select customers from the
list and click the Add button. Now, click the Close button.
3. Your query design view should look as follows:
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4. To get our answer, we need to specify the information that our query is to return from the Customers table. Please note
that Select queries will NOT change or modify the data in your underlying table, these queries simply make copies of the
table data and manipulate the temporary, copied data. For our first query, double click on the CustomerName field. This
will then place that field in the first column at the bottom of your screen. Now, double click on the State field to place it in
the second column below. When you are finished, your design screen should look as follows:
5. Before running the query, we want to sort the results by state so that we can count
the number of Delaware customers. To do this, click S ort in the State column. This
will reveal a pull-down menu. Click on the pull-down menu and select Ascending
from the menu.
6. click the Save button and give your query the name q
1Query then press OK
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7. Now, let’s run the query by clicking on the Run button in the toolbar toward the top of your screen.
8. Your query should return two columns of data sorted in ascending alphabetical order by state name. As
you can see, there is one (1) customer from Delaware, five (5) customers from Maryland, and three (3) customers from
Virginia.
9. Close and save your query if prompted.
CREATING SELECT QUERIES WITH SEARCH CRITERIA: Suppose that you want to answer the following question: “Where are your
Giant customers located?” We could simply sort the results by Customer Name and count the number of Giant customers, but this
could take a very long time if we have a large database. It turns out that Access has some very powerful query options that make it
possible to only return our Giant customers. To do this, we will create a copy of our first query, and then modify it to answer this
question.
10. The first step is to make a copy of the first query. Llocate q1Query on the left side of the
screen, left-click on the query, and click Copy.
11. Lleft click again on q1Query and click on Paste. This will launch the Paste As dialog box.
Name the copy q2Query and click OK.
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12. Open q2Query and click on the Design View button in the upper left corner of the screen. This will launch q2Query in
Design View. To limit our search results to only customers with the name
Giant, click on the Criteria field below Customer Name and type in
“Giant” (in quotes) in the Criteria field. Now save the query to update it.
13. Run your query.
14. Your q2Query results should look as follows: There are a total of three
Giant customers in the database (two in MD, and one in VA).
15. Close and save your query if prompted
CREATING AGGREGATE (GROUP BY) QUERIES: If you have a lot of data and you want the database to do the counting for you, you
need to create an Aggregate Query. To demonstrate how to do this, let’s answer the question “H
ow many orders contain 1L Clear
Pure water?”
16. The first step is to create a blank query (follow the steps in Creating a Basic Select Query above).
17. Add the Products table and the Sales Detail table by double clicking on both. Close the Show Table window.
18. Your screen should look like this:
19. Now, double click on Product Name from the Products table (this will place Product Name in the first column of the query).
Next, double click on Quantity from the Sales Detail table (this will place Quantity in the second column of the query). Your
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screen should now look as follows:
20. Since we want Access to aggregate (i.e. sum or count) the results, click the Totals button in the toolbar at the top of the
screen. This will add a new row to our query called Total, with the words “Group by” added to each column in this new
row:
21. Click on “Group By” underneath Quantity and a pull-down menu will appear. Select Count from the menu.
22. In the Criteria field below Product Name, add “1L Clear Pure” (in quotes).
23. Your query should now look like this:
24. Now, save your query as q3Query and run it. Your results should look like this:
NOTE: based on the additions you made to your database, your number may be different!
25. Close your query and save if prompted.
GROUPING: Microsoft Access also allows you to group results by more than one field. To do this, you simply designate more than
one “Group By” field. For example, if you want Access to answer the question “W
hat are the costs of your products?” you would do
the following.
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26. First, create a blank query and add the Products table
27. Add the Product Name and Cost fields by double clicking
28. Click the Totals button in the toolbar at the top of the screen
29. Your query should look as like this:
30. Save the query as q4Query and run it. Your results should look as follows:
STOP!
You are finished querying your data! Before you move on to Part 3, CLOSE Access and SUBMIT this part in myClasses.
Make sure you read the grading Rubric below.
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Grading for this part is as follows:
Description of Requirement Part 3 Points
q1Query: what customers do you have in DE 5
q2Query: where are your giant customers located? 5
q3Query: How many orders contain 1L Clear Pure water? 5
q4Query: What are the costs of your products? 5
Total 20 Points
