VB Code for Events

When you right-click on a form object and select 'Build Event' Access usually gives you a choice of three options:

• the Expression Builder
• the Macro Builder
• the Code Builder

Most developers will always want to use the 'Code Builder' - the VBA editor - so that that can edit Visual Basic code and there is a simple way to bypass the options and get this automatically every time.

1. Open a database.
2. Select Options from the Tools menu
3. Pick the Forms/Reports tab
4. Click the tick box labelled 'Always use event procedures'
5. Use the OK button to close the Options dialog.

The next time that you try to create code for an event Access will bypass the choices of Expression Builder and Macro Builder and will take you straight to the VBA code editor.

This works in all versions of Microsoft Access from 97 to 2002.