Well, you do get a 'orange' border if you enable themed controls.
Take a look at the very last screen in the following series of shots.
You will note that the first button has a slight blue border (that is the
currently selected button called search contracts), and the 2nd button has
slight orange boarder, and that was where my mouse pointer was hovering when
I took the screen shot (you can't see the mouse).
http://www.members.shaw.ca/AlbertKallal/Atheme/index.htm
Also, for expanding buttons, well, all controls can have a right click, or
shortcut menu set (you find this setting in the other tab). These menus are
built via drag and drop with the mouse. Note that each option on the menu
can simply call your VBA code in a module, or the forms code module.
You can see some more screen shots of menus, and why you would use them in
ms-access here:
http://www.members.shaw.ca/AlbertKallal/Articles/UseAbility/UserFriendly.htm
And, as for using HTML vs rich windows forms?
Well, obviously rich forms are lot more interactive and responsive.
Here is some more screen shots of displaying data in grids.
http://www.members.shaw.ca/AlbertKallal/Articles/Grid.htm
Virtually all of the above screen shots were made using native ms-access
controls, and no 3rd party stuff, or activeX controls were used.
Do note that you can use most activeX controls with ms-access forms, but as
good rule, you should avoid using activeX controls. (you advoid them because
they are LOT more work to setup, and worse you will have nothing but
problems if you have to install/move the application to another pc).
