Auto fill

[Guest]

I have a question about auto fill,
I am building a database to store personal information (i.e. name, contact
information, and the amount of money we gave an applicant on a particular
date). My question is, how can I get Access to try and auto fill a field
just like Excel does on a spread sheet.
Example:
If I already have one record entered in the database for John Doe who
resides at 1234 Main Street, Bethesda, MD 20814…If I am in the name field on
my form, and being to type the letters “Johâ€â€¦ how can I get Access to try
and fill in John Doe, because his personal information was already data
entered from a previous record. Just like excel tries to do when you are
typing in a column.

 

[Rick B]

That is not a feature of Access, it is a feature of Excel.

You can similuate this by making your field a drop-down list.

Rick B

 

[Guest]

Hi-

Rick is right about the "AutoFill" type of feature, but it suggests another
issue as well. My apologies if I am misinterpreting your intent, but one of
the advantages of a relational database is that the same data need not (and
should not) have to be entered more than once. It is the relationships
between tables that allows a data item to be retrieved accurately &
associated with other data whenever necessary.

If you are actually trying to have the existing record presented on a
"contextual" basis, there are several techniques you might look into. Combo
boxes are one tool, as are filters, parameter queries and so on. If the
form's record source is the table where that record is stored, the choices
may not be exactly the same as if the record needs to be retrieved from a
different table.

Hope this is useful |:>)

 

[Guest]

How can I go about doing this. If I make the field a drop down box, can I
enter information in this box that is not already entered?
Example: If I only have records for Jane Doe and John Smith. Can I add a
new person "Sarah Lee" by using the drop down box on the form if her name is
not already stored.
Also, I have another question, if I enter the information for Jane Doe and I
have her address data in a different field, is there a way that I can have
Access automatically enter the address information in that field if all the
information for Jane Doe has been entered perviously. Basically, when I enter
her name, the stored address automatcially is entered in the corresponding
fields?
Any help you can give me will be deeply appreciated, THANKS!!!

 

[Jeff Boyce]

I'll back up CyberTaz on this point -- my impression from reading your
description was that you are duplicating data.

A well-normalized design in a relational database would mean that you would
NEVER re-enter John Doe's personal information. You'd only need to
associate J.D. (his ID, actually) with other facts.