Document and print your database design

Microsoft Access can help you prepare printed documentation of your database's design, which you can use for offline reference and planning. Specifically, Access can help you print table relationships as depicted in the Relationship window, and can help you print the design characteristics of database objects, such as object properties.

Note: The Relationships window is not available in web databases or web apps.

What do you want to do?

Prepare the Relationships window for printing

Print the Relationships window

Print the design characteristics of database objects using the Database Documenter

Prepare the Relationships window for printing

The Relationship window is a window in which you view, create, and edit relationships between tables and queries. Depending on how you configure it, the Relationships window does not always show all the relationships in your database. You should decide which relationships you want to document — and prepare the Relationships window accordingly — before you print table relationships. You can show or hide tables in the Relationships window, and you can rearrange their layout.

Show or hide a table in the Relationships window

1. On the Database Tools tab click Relationships.

2. Do one of the following:

   • To show a table, on the Design tab, in the Relationships group, click Show Table, and then in the Show Table dialog box, add the table that you want.

   • To hide a table, in the Relationship window, click the table that you want to hide, and then press DELETE.

3. Press CTRL+S to save your changes.

Rearrange tables in the Relationships window

1. To rearrange tables, drag them to the positions that you want in the Relationships window.

2. Press CTRL+S to save your changes.

Print the Relationships window

You can create a report that displays the relationships in your database as they appear in the Relationships window. This report has the default name Relationships for database name. By default, the report's header contains the name and the date that you created the report.

Note: Print Preview does not offer a good way for you to edit the Relationship Report. You should make sure that the Relationships window looks the way you want before you generate the report.

1. Open the Access database that has relationships you want to print.

2. On the Database Tools tab click Relationships.

3. On the Design tab, in the Tools group, click Relationship Report.

   A report that depicts the Relationships window opens in Print Preview mode.

4. To make any adjustments to the way your report will print, use commands on the Print Preview tab.

5. On the Print Preview tab, in the Print group, click Print.

Print the design characteristics of database objects

You can use the Database Documenter to print the design characteristics of database objects.

1. Open the database that you want to document.

2. On the Database Tools tab, in the Analyze group, click Database Documenter.

3. In the Documenter dialog box, click the tab that represents the type of database object that you want to document. To create a report on all of the objects in a database, click the All Object Types tab.

4. Select one or more of the objects listed on the tab. To select all of the objects on a tab, click Select All.

5. Click OK.

   The Database Documenter creates a report that contains detailed data for each selected object, and then opens the report in Print Preview. For example, if you run the Database Documenter against a data entry form, the report created by the Documenter lists the properties for the form as a whole, the properties for each of the sections in the form, and the properties for any buttons, labels, text boxes, and other controls on the form, plus any code modules and user permissions that are associated with the form.

6. To print the report, on the Print Preview tab, in the Print group, click Print.

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