Creating new form for another user.

[Switchwork]

Please help me with this one!!!

The problem I am having is this. When I designed the database for our company is was only me that would be using it as no-one else in our office had any knowledge what so ever of Access or even much knowledge of computers in general. So I never designed it for anyone else to use except myself. Now however I have had to move onto other tasks and pass the data entry part of my job to my collegue the controller. (I work for a courier company). The problem is he will be entering jobs in as we receive them and most of the time we don't receive all of the relevant data until the next day. So what we are wanting to do is for him to enter all the data he has for each job and then the next day for me to complete it with the rest of the data. So that means us both be entering data onto the JobDetails form. I didn't think this could be done. So the only other way I can come up with doing this is to design another form for him to complete and somehow retreive the data entered onto that form by him onto my form that day. This doesn't sound the best way to do this to me as we will then have to copies of some of the data but I really cannot figure else what to do regarding this situation and am in desperate need of help and guidance regarding this matter.

There must be an easier way to acheive what we want to do. I am also needing to find out how I can close of most of the database to him so he doesn't accidently change anything on it. I know this can be done but am not sure how to go about it. My design up until now has worked fine for what we needed it for but as our business is expanding and I have more work to do I have to try and change the database to suit the needs of my collegue as I mentioned earlier in totally new to the computer world.

I would really appreciate any advice and guidance you may have on the above subjects as I am in desperate need to begin these changes as soon as possible.

Thank you in advance for any advice I receive from you. If it wasn't for you sharing your expertise with me I would never ever have got this far with the database and trust me it is running perfectly for me. However these new things that are coming up are threatening the perfect running of my database.
I really hope I have explained clearly what it is I want to acheive.
Thank you again. and hope to hear from you as soon as possible.

 

[SQL_Hell]

Hi,

Firstly is your database split into a front end and a backend?

You can change the database security options by selecting tools\startup, here you will see options like 'show full menus', 'show database window' untick these and choose a form for the database to start on.

Now when your other user opens the database he will only be able to see the form you have chosen in the startup options, if you want to get into the database to do some design work, then when you open the database hold the shift button down and that will stop all startup options i.e. so you can see the database window etc.

Have a play around with these options and is your database is not split then make sure you do split it, it will cut down on netwrok traffic.

 

[Switchwork]

Hi,

Firstly is your database split into a front end and a backend?

You can change the database security options by selecting tools\startup, here you will see options like 'show full menus', 'show database window' untick these and choose a form for the database to start on.

Now when your other user opens the database he will only be able to see the form you have chosen in the startup options, if you want to get into the database to do some design work, then when you open the database hold the shift button down and that will stop all startup options i.e. so you can see the database window etc.

Have a play around with these options and is your database is not split then make sure you do split it, it will cut down on netwrok traffic.

If I split the database to front end back end thing will I have total access to the database as I have just tried to design a new form and because a collegue of mine has it open I get a message saying that I do not have exclusive access to the database and should I make any changes they may not be saved. Will this Split database thing solve that problem?? If not then is there another way of solving this problem??
Thank you for your time in answering this question.

 

[SQL_Hell]

Yes, that is another advantage of splitting the database.

Basically what happens is that you have the database stored on the network, with only the tables and data in it. Then you have another database that holds all the forms, queries and reports, this is stored on the users machine.

So you can change forms all day long, without affecting anyone, you will only be affecting the database file that is stored on your machine.

 

[Switchwork]

Yes, that is another advantage of splitting the database.

Basically what happens is that you have the database stored on the network, with only the tables and data in it. Then you have another database that holds all the forms, queries and reports, this is stored on the users machine.

So you can change forms all day long, without affecting anyone, you will only be affecting the database file that is stored on your machine.

Thank you for that. This is what I am going to do. Didn't think I had to get into all this technical stuff when I designed the database as it was originally only for me to use. Now with the new computers it makes sense to split the database. However I have one more question. Can I also enter data into the forms from my computer or will I only have the design parts?? IS this a stupid question?? Apologies but just need to make sure!!!

Thank you again for your time.

Switchwork AKA Clare!

 

[Pat Hartman]

Your current practice of making modifications to the "production" database needs to stop. It is far too risky and besides, A2K and newer will not allow you to modify objects in a db that has been opened by someone else (unless you are using SourceSafe). You both will be allowed to modify data. Access will keep track of changes and lock records as necessary.

Your first task is to split the database. The be database which will contain ONLY tables must be placed on a shared network drive so that everyone who needs to access can get to it. The fe can also be placed on a shared network drive but normally it is distributed so that each user has his own copy.

Once that is done, you would make the changes to your private copy of the fe. Once they are working, you can distribute a new copy of the fe to your coworkers. If you need to modify table structures, you need to do that directly in the be database. So, if that happens, remove the be from the shared directory (after informing people that it will not be available for a time), make a BACKUP, make the modifications, put the be back on the shared drive.

You should not need to make a new form for each user. That is a poor design descision. You don't want to have to keep making new forms every time some new person needs access to the db!

 

[Switchwork]

Thank you for this. Sorry I have not checked in for a while but had lots to do. Thankyou again for answering my queries however I am now confused, I was advised to design a new form for myself to add the extra data. This is the thing I designed the database with a form for myself to use to enter in the jobs the day after they had been done. All was fine. Then recently my workload has risen so I now enter the information that was not made available at the time of the job the day after at the same time as my collegue is entering jobs on as they come in. That is why I designed a new form for myself so that I didn't have to use the same form as it wouldn't let us both use it. His form is based on the jobDEtails tbl myform is based on the same table but also on a query for certain date. When I open my form I get a parameter asking for the date of the day I want to enter details for. So the forms are not exactly alike. I hadn't even thought of doing this until it was suggested on one of these forums not sure which one.

Basically I use my computer as a work station and it is also the server. I am the accounts manager so aswell as my entering the rest of the details from the drivers sheets I have to produce a weekly report on a breakdown of jobs we have done for each of our customers and attach it to the invoice. So from my computer I need access to the my reports and the form for me to continue entering data the day after the jobs have been done.

Please let me know what it is I can do as this is now really doing my head in now. I have been advised to do something and now it seems that it was a bad idea.

Thankyou for you help if you could help me some more regarding this matter I would be most grateful and I appreciate the help i have received so far. Trust me I won't begin anything until I have all the information I need to do it I really want to do this right and not muck up my database.

Thank you again and hope to hear from you soon.