Hello experts,
For some reason I can't find ANYTHING on Google about how to build a simple asset tracking database. All my searches come up with software to purchase. I have Access 2000 and I am fairly proficient. There are NO barcodes.
Situation: small, government funded business that has 3 separate (departments/projects) and 15 employees that runs workshops and resource centres for the public. We want to make a database to keep track of our "assets" such as computers - we have 3 computer labs - printers, monitors, resource books, furniture etc. since we are accountable to the government on what we spent their money on ;-)
Previously we have been using Excel spreadsheets for this but it is really an inadequate way of doing it. Not only is it not relational, but it is very hard to update when we get anything new or move something around. And impossible to track when something has been maintained/repaired or replaced.
OK I know there is a database template for asset tracking. I've tried to use it as a starting point and I found I had to change so much it might be easier to start over.
For one thing, there are a lot of things we don't need, like depreciation.
For another, it only had one table for ALL assets. Now I'm not all that knowledgeable but, I believe it is not good design as there would be many empty fields. Such as, computers would have many more fields than a keyboard - like computername, workgroup and IP address, and chairs/desks would not have serial numbers. It doesn't make sense to me to have it all in one table.
So I've thought of making one table for each kind of asset. i.e. one for computers, one for monitors, one for keyboard, one for mice, one for furniture, one for books, one for kitchen appliances (microwave, fridge etc) in all there would be 13 tables for assets.
In addition to that there would be a table for vendors, employees, department ID, and secondary tables like "computer type" (workstation/server).
What I am looking for is a link to a tutorial or somewhere on the web to help me set this up or get started. Tables I can do OK, but the reports, forms, and queries in the asset tracking template that is provided by Access, are designed to use only ONE asset table, so they are all useless and have to be done from scratch. But I'm struggling with setting up reports for so many tables.
Tips would be appreciated. SHOULD I be using only one asset table, or am I on the right track?
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