Access 2010: The Missing Manual

Managing Macros

As you build more and more snazzy macros, you’ll need some way to keep them all organized and to make sure the macros you need are at your fingertips when you need them. Access gives you a few tools to help, including submacros, which combine related macros into one object for easier storage, and macro shortcut keys, which let you trigger the right macro exactly when you need it.

Note

In previous versions of Access, the submacro feature was called “macro groups."Although the feature still works the same way, Microsoft changed the name to avoid confusion with the new grouping feature (Collapsing, Expanding, and Grouping Macro Actions), which is completely unrelated.

Submacros

The average macro is only three to five actions long. However, the average database that uses macros quickly accumulates dozens of them. Managing these tiny programs can become quite a headache, especially when you need to remember what each macro does.

To help manage your macros, you can use the submacro feature. Technically, a submacro is a small, named bundle of actions. The nifty part about submacros is that you can put as many submacros as you want into a single macro object. (It’s sort of like the way you organize computer files by grouping them together in folders.) Using submacros, you can keep related functionality close together, so you have an easier time finding the macro you need when it’s time to edit it.

Note

Access masters use submacros to group together macros that they use on the same ...