Data Control

I will now take you through the few basic steps required to create a program that will show you records in an Access database. We will then eventually expand this program, to provide support for adding & deleting records, and searching etc.

Firstly, create a new project, and add a DataControl to the form. It looks like this: . Set its name property to datTitles, and its Text property to Titles. 

Next, you can click the ... (3 periods) next to the DatabaseName property. A browse dialog will be shown. An example Access database, which we will use, called Biblio.mdb is provided with VB, and should be located in the same folder that VB was installed in. If you can't find it, you can download it here. Before proceeding, I recommend you save a copy of it and name it Biblio_original.mdb, so that if you make any changes you don't like you can restore the original database without having to reinstall VB, or search around on the CD.

Once you have located the file, select it, and click open. This has specified the database where the control will get its information from.

Now you need to select the table you want the control to get the fields from - click the arrow next to the RecordSource property, and select Titles

These are the basic steps in using the Data Control. Next, you need to add some labels and text boxes that will show the contents of each field. In order to do this, you need to bind them to the Data control, by setting each of the text boxes DataSource property to datTitles (the DataControl), and setting its DataField property to the field you want it to display. You can also add labels next to each text box so that the user knows what field each textbox is linked to. Add the following text boxes:

Now, save and run your project. Try clicking each of the arrows on the DataControl. You will see, that the control loops through each record in the table, and updates the text in all of the bound text boxes. All without you writing a single line of code!