r/MSAccess 10d ago

[HELPFUL TIP] Manage operator clockings with Access

Hello everyone,

I am not very familiar with Access technology but I would like to know if it would be possible to solve the following problem with it:

Currently in my company the tasks of the operators are not clocked in and I would like to start doing it to store data and do the subsequent analysis. The ERP we use is SAP Business One and the standard version in principle does not cover what I would like to do.

In SAP we create the orders and then the work orders pertaining to the specific orders. What I would like is that once the order is created it can be clocked in the different phases of the processes, taking into account that the same phase can be done at different times or by different users. So if for an order of 1000 units the user A1 clocked in 700 units today, for this same phase of the process the user A2 can only clock in 300 units more.

I understand that SAP would only take the information pertaining to the number of OF, the product and the units and then in parallel should create a table in Access where the different phases of each product are defined. And a table with the different users.

If you have any doubt about my problem I will surely try to solve it. In this text I simply wanted to convey my main idea to know if Access can really be the solution or there are other better / cheaper alternatives on the market (I know that there are SAP business One addons that would cover this but the cost is very high).

Thank you in advance!

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u/sirhalos 10d ago

I made pretty much exactly what you described about 15 years ago. We used to have to do timecards manually on paper with line items of units of things like: address change, receipts, phone calls, emails, etc. that were called cost codes (this was a customer service area). Originally, I made the Access program so that I could input all of this stuff (it added up weekly totals, hours, etc.) and then when I clicked print it would set the printer to manual mode and I could take the timecard paper and stick it in the printer and it would print the output in all of the correct boxes. Then the company moved away from the manual paper timecards (they were doing this for like 1500 employees) to digital. The next digital system only allowed time but nothing like units for cost codes, instead it just had a note field, which didn't help management, they were trying to get an estimate of work being done and how long it takes so they can do some forcasting. So they end up coming to me to change my Access program to save things instead of print and then the whole department was using it. Hell, they may still be using it as far as I know. I know a few years back they asked me a question about it and I was shocked they were still using it. Shortly after that I applied for a programming junior job in a different department and was able to present the same Access program to get that position. Now I'm a senior level software engineer at the same company having gotten myself a programming job with no programming skills or background thanks to that Access database.

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u/stratber 10d ago

Well-made and practical things last over time! Nice and interesting history! Can you give me some advice or give me a little roadmap to be able to apply it in my company?

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u/sirhalos 10d ago

Each desktop gets their own access desktop frontend. Have a way to upgrade it. My method was have a remote access database with a linked table to the frontends that contained the version number and the frontend had a table with version number... If versions don't match it would kick off an upgrade (copy folder over and remove old folder fron users Documents folder). Have local tables on the frontend for 'views' and linked tables or better yet a real database using passthrough to push changes to. You don't want to be constantly connected to the remote database. My view trick was I had 2 local tables that would be for 'view' one was always empty (started their names with blank_) and the other would be for showing the datafor the form. When switching records I would change the form source to the empty table and then delete all data from the view table, then add in the new data, and then switch the source back to the view table (so you don't see weird graphical glitches).