Table Question for Access 97

[sportsdream]

Hello,

I am new to Access 97. I have read soem onlien tutorials which were
very helpful.

What I am creating is an asset tracking database.

My customer table stores name, phone, and location (primary key)
My Hardware Table stores Hardware Type (drop down box that stores PC,
Printer, Monitor), Location, and PC Tag (primary key)

What i need to add is a table of software. Say like Microsoft Word.
That could be on several machines but not necessarily all. I'd like to
associate the table to the PC Tag. Any ideas what I need in my table
and how I would associate the relationship?

Thanks,

Michael Paniak

 

[sportsdream]

Just to help clarify, Each PC Tag will have like 10-30 different
softwares associated with it. I already have a query that pulls only
the computer tags and not the printer or monitor tags. Thanks.

 

[Al Camp]

Michael,
I'd consider treating software just like hardware, using the same PCTag
and tables that you're using right now.
I'd add a field to Hardware that would allow you to select "Hardware" or
"Software" (or H or S) to differentiate the entries, and try to use
"somewhat" the same fields hardware uses to describe your software.
Something like this...
Item Desc Size/Version
Hardware HardDrive 20G
Hardware CDROM 650MB
Software MSWord V7.2

If the info you keep for software will not associate well with the info
you keep for hardware, then create a seperate Software table and link it to
your PC table via PCTag... just like you did with hardware. The PC table
can have a One to Many relationship with more than one table.
On your form, you could have a "Tab" for Hardware, and a Tab for
Software, each with their own subform.
hth
Al Camp
Candia Computer Consulting - Candia NH
http://home.comcast.net/~cccsolutions

 

[John Vinson]

Hello,

I am new to Access 97. I have read soem onlien tutorials which were
very helpful.

What I am creating is an asset tracking database.

My customer table stores name, phone, and location (primary key)
My Hardware Table stores Hardware Type (drop down box that stores PC,
Printer, Monitor), Location, and PC Tag (primary key)

What i need to add is a table of software. Say like Microsoft Word.
That could be on several machines but not necessarily all. I'd like to
associate the table to the PC Tag. Any ideas what I need in my table
and how I would associate the relationship?

You'll need *two* tables, not one; any time you have a many
(computers) to many (software) relationship you'll find you need a
table to "resolve" the relationship.

There'll be a Software table, with a record for Word, one for Access,
one for Doom, etc.; you might want to store separate records for each
version, or to have two tables Software and Versions in a one to many
relationship.

Then there would be a SoftwareInstalled table, with a PCTag field
linking it to Hardware, and a SoftwareID field linking it to the
Software table.

For data entry you'll use a Form (based on the PC table) with a
Subform based on SoftwareInstalled. See the Northwind sample
database's Orders table for an example of how this would work.

John W. Vinson[MVP]

 

[sportsdream]

Thanks everyone for the fast reply. I am going to try this and I will
let you know how well or poor I am in implimenting the solutions.

 

[sportsdream]

This worked great. After adding a table with Software ID and with PC
Tag I broke the relationships to one-to-many.