Add sounds to your Access form events

Microsoft Access

Would you like a sound to play each time a user opens or closes a form or clicks on a form control? Access lets you play a sound for any form event.

For example, to have a sound play when a form is opened, follow these steps:

1. Open the Form in Design View.
2. Press Alt + F11.
3. Go to View | Project Explorer.
4. Insert | New Module.
5. Enter this code at the prompt:

Declare Function apisndPlaySound Lib "winmm" Alias "sndPlaySoundA" 
(ByVal filename As String, ByVal snd_async As Long) As Long

Function Playsound(sWavFile As String) 

'Purpose: Plays a sound. 

'Argument: the fu11 path and file name.

If apisndPlaySound(sWavFile, 1) = 0 Then 

MsgBox "The Sound Did Not Play!" 

End If 

End Function

1. Press Alt + Q.
2. On the form's Property sheet, click in the OnOpen event box on the Event tab.

1. Click the Build button and then enter the code below at the prompt. (Be sure to use the full pathname to your sound file.)

Playsound ("C:I386Chimes.wav")

1. Press Alt + Q.

Microsoft Excel

Excel makes it easy to create a quick chart. You select the data and click the Chart Wizard button and a few clicks later, you have a great looking chart.

It seldom stops there though. It isn't uncommon at all to update the underlying data and subsequently need to update the chart.

For instance, if a chart displays sales for only the first three quarters of the year, eventually, you'll want to add the fourth quarter. You could recreate the chart but usually, you've done enough customizing that you won't want to start over from scratch.

Fortunately, adding a series to an existing chart is a simple copy task:

1. Select the new data that you want to add to the chart. Don't select the entire worksheet--select only the new data. As you can see below, the existing chart's data consist of the first three quarters. To add the fourth quarter to the column chart, select just the fourth quarter data.

2. Press [Ctrl]+C to copy the new data to the Clipboard.
3. Select the chart.
4. Press [Ctrl]+V to copy the new data from the Clipboard to the new chart. A simple copy and paste task updates the existing chart by adding the fourth quarter series.

Microsoft Word

Keyboard shortcuts are a mainstay for most Word users who are trying to streamline their work. Even brand-new users start slinging around Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V soon after mastering the intricacies of scrolling.

But keyboard shortcuts are often nonintuitive and hard to remember. (What mnemonic would you use to recall that Ctrl+E centers document text or that Ctrl+T produces a hanging indent?)

That's where mouse shortcuts--the unsung hero of built-in functionality--can take up the slack. Users probably know the basic moves: Right-click on an item to display a shortcut menu, double-click to select a word, triple-click to select a paragraph.

But Word has quite a few additional mouse tricks up its sleeve. This overview will help you (and your users) learn some easily remembered techniques to gain quick access to a host of Word options.

Talkback 0 comments

• Implementation Manager, AVP Client Service & Delivery
• Executive, MIS
• Head of Management Information System
• Configuration Management Coordinator
• Senior Project Manager Software Applications / systems Integration

Cutting-edge technology from premium sponsors

What are
Eco-Products? »

View Featured
Eco-Products »

Brought to you by:

 

 

 

More Tech Showcases:

Juniper Networks

Hitachi Eco-Products