Using LIKE statement in an SQL query requires specifying wild cards in the search pattern. In C# .NET, the wild card is %, however if you are building your SQL query directly from MS Access, I found out you need to use the asterisk (*) instead of (%) wild card to achieve the same result.
For example, the following SQL statement will return every item whose title contains the word "Microsoft":
SELECT * FROM Items WHERE Title LIKE "%Microsoft%"
The above statement when run from a C# application, it will return all items with the word "Microsoft" contained in their title strings.
In my case, I put the however, I needed to run the SQL query directly from my MS Access database. I found out the % wild card does not work.
Instead, I had to modify my SQL statement as follows:
SELECT * FROM Items WHERE Title LIKE "*Microsoft*"
This is something that has to do with DAO & ADO... any SQL gurus out there that can elaborate further on this?