"LOST" data

  • Thread starter Thread starter amber
  • Start date Start date
A

amber

Help! I have a database that is shared by 4 users. One
user has claimed on multiple occasions that her entries
are not there. None of the other users are having any
issues. I have reviewed multiple back-up copies of the
database and can find no occurrences of the data, so it
looks like it was never saved to the database.

What could be happening here?


Thanks,
Amber
 
Amber,

I suppopse you're working with linked tables ? If you are, then I strongly
suggest you have a look at the links. Or maybe that user isn't even working
with linked tables, but with his/her own local copy of the data, that aren't
(and won't ever be this way) reflected in the common (linked-to) database.

Kind regards,

flupp
 
Do you have any code that closes forms? If so, you need to be aware that the
Close action/method will silently lose the user's entry (no warning) if
there is any reason the record cannot be saved, e.g. validation rule not
met, required field not present, duplicate index, and so on. For more
information on this bug, see:
Losing data when you close a form
at:
http://allenbrowne.com/bug-01.html

Another possible pitfall relates to foreign keys. If you do not set the
Required property to Yes for your foreign keys, Access permits Null values,
even when you have Referential Integrity enabled. Typically what happens is
that the user enters something into a subform when the main form is at a new
record. The foreign key is entered as Null. The record goes into the table,
but since it does not match anything in the main form, it never shows up in
the subform again and the user thinks it is lost. This case would be
tracable because the data is there in the related table.

If neither of those apply, it is possible that there is a network problem or
hardware issue with her computer, so its connection is unstable. If this
were so, you would expect her to be getting "Lost connection" type messages,
and it could also be corrupting the database (since interrupted writes do
that).

A final possibility is that there is a corrupt index in one of the tables. A
compact/repair should fix that, but it sounds unlikely as that should occur
for all users.
 
Hi Amber

Another suggestion, have you checked if this user uses really a shortcut or has he copied the whole database on his desktop - have seen this in our company quite a while ago ;-

Bernd
 
Help! I have a database that is shared by 4 users. One
user has claimed on multiple occasions that her entries
are not there. None of the other users are having any
issues. I have reviewed multiple back-up copies of the
database and can find no occurrences of the data, so it
looks like it was never saved to the database.
Click to expand...

There's a known "misfeature" in Access that causes *erroneous* data to
appear to be lost: in fact it's never actually saved. If a user enters
data that is invalid (for instance, is missing a required field, or
violates relational integrity) and closes the form, the record is not
saved and no error message is generated. Since normally closing a form
does save the current record, this gives the user the impression that
they entered the data and Access "lost it". Could this be the cause of
this user's problem?
 
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