Anomaly in Northwind?

[Guest]

In the products table, the SupplierID & CategoryID, both have been defined
for Numbers, whereas when you see it in datasheet view you get to see the
Supplier Names (not just the caption) & categories, both in text format. How
this is done? Though the SupplierID has an associated query in the lookup
section, still the basic field property is Number. Can anyone clarify? Thanks

 

[Douglas J. Steele]

Unfortunately, Microsoft samples aren't always examples of good coding
practice.

In this case, they've used the noxious Lookup Field. See
http://www.mvps.org/access/lookupfields.htm at "The Access Web" for some of
the many reasons why most of us do not recommend using lookup fields.