Access 2007 for Starters: The Missing Manual

Sorting and Filtering in a Form

Sorting and filtering are two indispensable features that Access gives you with Form view. Learning how to use them could hardly be easier—in fact, you already learned everything you need to know when you tackled the datasheet in Chapter 3. The creators of Access took great care to ensure that filtering and sorting work the same in forms as they do in the datasheet. You use the same commands, on the same part of the ribbon, to put them into action.

Sorting a Form

As you've probably realized by now, forms show your data in raw, unsorted order. So records appear in the order you created them. (The only exception is if you create a form that gets its data from a query, and that query uses sorting.)

Fortunately, sorting's easy. In fact, you can sort the records that are shown in a form in exactly the same way you sort records in a datasheet. Choose the field you want to use for sorting, right-click it, and then choose one of the sorting options. In a text-based field, you'll see the sorting choices "Sort A to Z" (for an alphabetical sort) and "Sort Z to A" (for a reverse-alphabetical sort). You can also use the Ascending and Descending buttons on the ribbon's Home → Sort & Filter section.

For more information about your sorting options (including how to sort by multiple fields), see Section 3.2.1.

Filtering a Form

Filtering's a feature that lets you cut down the total number of records so you see only those that interest you. Filtering can pick out active ...