Help Please

[Guest]

I hate to ask this question but I have been trying for a very long time to
get a database started in my office. I work for an architect and we have
several draftsman here working on various projects. We also bill most of our
clients on an hourly rate basis and I would like to be able to keep track of
the draftsmen's time per project. Also we are doing a lot more Construction
Management jobs as well and I was wanting to have some sort of Subcontractors
table to keep track of specific trades, insurance exp., bid acceptances, etc.
per project as well.

At this point i center around project numbers for reference to most of
everything.

Can someone please help me with what fields for what tables, Please? I hope
I dont sound too dumb but i think if i could just get some help to jump start
me I will be able to do the rest, lol.

Thank you
Monique

 

[John W. Vinson]

I hate to ask this question but I have been trying for a very long time to
get a database started in my office. I work for an architect and we have
several draftsman here working on various projects. We also bill most of our
clients on an hourly rate basis and I would like to be able to keep track of
the draftsmen's time per project. Also we are doing a lot more Construction
Management jobs as well and I was wanting to have some sort of Subcontractors
table to keep track of specific trades, insurance exp., bid acceptances, etc.
per project as well.

At this point i center around project numbers for reference to most of
everything.

Can someone please help me with what fields for what tables, Please? I hope
I dont sound too dumb but i think if i could just get some help to jump start
me I will be able to do the rest, lol.

Thank you
Monique

Well... you certainly would not want a project number in a table of
Contractors, or a table of Trades, etc.

You need to identify what kind of Entities - real-life persons, things, or
events - are ofimportance to your business. Some possible entities here are
Clients (and a client might be involved in one project, multiple projects,
perhaps not yet any projects at all); Projects; Draftsmen; Contractors
(including subs); bids; etc. etc. Each type of entity gets its own table, with
fields only for attributes of that kind of entity. Each table would have a
Primary Key uniquely identifying each entity of that type; and you'll need to
identify the relationships between entities (e.g. each Client will receive
zero, one or more Bills; each Bill will be billed to one and only one client).
Many to Many relationships will be frequent - each Draftsman will work on
multiple Projects, and Projects may have one or more Draftsman. Each of these
many to many relationships will need a new table linked to each of the "one"
sides.

For some tutorials see

Jeff Conrad's resources page:
http://www.accessmvp.com/JConrad/accessjunkie/resources.html

The Access Web resources page:
http://www.mvps.org/access/resources/index.html

A free tutorial written by Crystal (MS Access MVP):
http://allenbrowne.com/casu-22.html

MVP Allen Browne's tutorials:
http://allenbrowne.com/links.html#Tutorials

John W. Vinson [MVP]

 

[Guest]

Monique,

you are at the point of defining your specification, 'data modeling',
'normailzation' of your project. This is the most crutial stage of any
project. Here are some good references to get you started

http://www.databasedev.co.uk/good_db_design.html
http://www.databasedev.co.uk/planning_database.html
http://www.databasedev.co.uk/1norm_form.html
http://www.databasedev.co.uk/2norm_form.html
http://www.databasedev.co.uk/3norm_form.html
http://www.databasedev.co.uk/design_tips.html
http://www.databasedev.co.uk/design_basics.html

What I would suggest is as follows.
Write down every item that you believe you will need to track
First Name
Last name
Title
Phone Number
....

Then start looking at common information and start grouping them together
(these group will become your table structures). Once you get to this point
post you groupings here and we can take a look and give you some feedback.

Also, always try to think ahead a bit. It is much easier at this stage to
make additions then later on.

 

[Guest]

ty very much for taking the time to give me a solution to my problem. I
obviously still have a lot of work ahead of me but this will give me a good
jump start. Again, ty.

 

[Guest]

Ty Daniel for the information that you have given me. It is obvious I have a
lot of work ahead of me. I will try your suggestions and get back with more
questions. Thank you for taking the time to answer my question. I greatly
appreciate it.