The Amazing Power of Microsoft Access Wildcards

The Microsoft Access wildcards are a powerful tool that can help you find and replace data in a Microsoft Access database quickly and effectively. Whether you’re searching for a specific record or replacing text in multiple records, Access wildcards can help you get the job done quickly and easily.

What are Microsoft Access Wildcards?

Microsoft Access wildcards are special characters that can be used in Access queries, filters and searches. These characters act as a placeholder for any characters that you don’t know or can’t remember. The two main wildcards are the question mark (?) and asterisk (*).

The Question Mark (?) Wildcard

The question mark (?) wildcard is used when you’re searching for a single character. For example, if you wanted to find all records that had the letter “a” in the second position, you would enter “?a” in the search field. This search would return all records that had any single character in the first position and the letter “a” in the second position.

The Asterisk (*) Wildcard

The asterisk (*) wildcard is used when you’re searching for multiple characters. For example, if you wanted to find all records that had the word “cat” in them, you would enter “*cat*” in the search field. This search would return all records that had any number of characters in front of and/or behind the word “cat”.

Using Wildcards in Access Queries

Wildcards can also be used in Access queries. This is particularly useful when you want to search for records that contain a specific phrase or word. For example, if you wanted to find all records that contained the phrase “the quick brown fox”, you would enter “the quick brown fox” in the query field and use the asterisk (*) wildcard to search for all records with that phrase.

Using Wildcards in Access Filters

Wildcards can also be used in Access filters. This is particularly useful when you want to filter out records that contain a specific phrase or word. For example, if you wanted to filter out all records that contained the word “cat”, you would enter “*cat*” in the filter field and use the asterisk (*) wildcard to filter out all records with that word.

Using Wildcards to Replace Text in Access

In addition to using wildcards for searching and filtering, you can also use wildcards to replace text in Access. For example, if you wanted to replace all occurrences of the word “cat” with the word “dog”, you would enter “*cat*” in the “Find What” field and “dog” in the “Replace With” field. This would replace all occurrences of the word “cat” with the word “dog

01-Feb-2023

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