Support persons often assume it's the users fault because 90% of the time, it is.
I reject that premise. In fact, it's all Microsoft's fault.
The problem is usually a combination of incorrect or inadequate documentation (which is not the programmers' fault, but it is the responsibility of the overall company selling an application to ensure that the instructions actually correspond to what the screen is doing when you push keys and click mice), coupled with the fact that there are too many nuances built into different brands of computer that make it impossible for the programmers to effectively anticipate all possible glitches. Between the little bits of operating system code that Microsoft keeps hidden for their own, exclusive use and the fact that various computer makers and chip suppliers hard-code in certain deviations from normalcy ... sorry, but I was a software beta tester for a number of years, and often I couldn't even use the provided instructions to install the application, let alone USE it.
Plus -- if YOU want to develop the application and then compile it into a free-standing application so the end users can't muck it up by accident (or by intention) -- the compiler will cost you several tousand bucks.
You'll be FAR better served to buy a copy of Alpha 5 and the cheapest version they offer of the run-time module. I know I keep repeating "Alpha 5," but only because it really is the best tool for your purpose.
I was referring to Desktop support, for reasons unknown to myself. Software support (something I've also done) is a little different. While there's still a high percentage of user-error, it is quite a bit less as most of that in our case is caught by the clients' IT staff. For a year before I moved up to being a programmer, I worked support for the software I now code. About half of my job was putting in requests for bugs clients had found to be fixed.
Documentation on the product I work on is more or less (more, really) non-existent, and on the specific contract I'm on, would be extremely difficult to do due to the really odd and overly-complicated product the customer has asked for through their specifications. Attempts by myself and others to actually make a program that works and makes sense results in immediate complaints that we didn't follow the spec. So we now just give them the product they ask for, rather than a product that would fit their needs, which results in complaints from the end users, but their management doesn't care, they want it how they asked for it.
On-topic, depending on price, Alpha 5 seems like it would fit the needs best. I have no personal experience with it, but I've heard a lot of good things about it, especially in comparison to Access, which I do (unfortunately) have some experience with.
