Data Entry Forms won't work

[Guest]

I thought this would be a simple deal. I want to create an order tracking
tool documenting 6 stages of movement, request, approval, order, received,
issued, disposition. After trying to normalize six different tables of info
I settled on just one table with a field for the 5 or 6 pieces of info for
each stage in the order tracking.
Form one includes fields 1-5 form two includes fields 1-10 form three
includes fields 1-15, etc etc. It is intended that person A complete form 1,
person B complete form 2 which has the info from Form One displayed for
reference, person C complete Form Three with the info from from the first two
forms displayed for reference etc etc.

I can create new records on the first form, but when opening subsequent
forms I cannot see the exisiting records. All the forms are based on the
same table. I tried another approach by basing each form on a separate
query, all the queries based on the same table but each query only containing
the fields required for each stage in the process. This didn’t work either.

Hopefully I am just missing some simple concept that my brain let go of.
Thanks for your help in advance.

 

[Rick B]

If you open a form and cannot see previous records, then you probably have
the form's "data entry" property set to true. Turn that property to false
and you will be able to see previous records.

"Data Entry" only allows new records to be created.

 

[Guest]

Some queries will not allow you to enter data, usually due to the possibility
of violating referential integrity. A quick way to check is to try entering
data into the query itself. If you cannot do it there, then you will not be
able to do it in a form that is based on that query.

I had created a database where I had to enter information into several
tables, before it would allow me to create records in a table that was
associated with those other tables. In that case, it was bad planning.

A database will behave as you tell it to behave, not as you want it to
behave. It can sometimes be tricky to track down the logic of why it is
acting the way it is.

 

[Guest]

So is there a way to add information in different empty fields to a record
that has already been created?

 

[Rick B]

Sure, just pull up that record and type data in the blank fields.