Move a Product List into Microsoft Access

Topic at a glance

Suppose you’re using a Microsoft Excel worksheet to maintain your company’s list of products. A list of repeating data can grow too large and become very difficult to maintain in Microsoft Excel. For example, if you want to generate a report that includes your customers’ addresses and phone numbers, you have to store the data in every row of the worksheet. You can make it easier to manage your product list by converting the worksheet to Microsoft Access and creating a database to add new entries. When you update information in one place, it’s updated everywhere in the database. Microsoft Access also makes it possible for several users to work in the database at the same time. When one user updates records, the updated information is made available to all users.

To complete the steps in this topic   you need Microsoft Office, Professional Edition or an individual copy of Microsoft Access installed. You also need the Microsoft Excel AccessLinks add-in installed and enabled. Note that your Microsoft Excel worksheet must be set up as a list.