Date an Octothorpe

"Bell Labs engineer, Don Macpherson, went to instruct their first client, the Mayo Clinic, in the use of the new (touch tone phone system). He felt the need for a fresh and unambiguous name for the # symbol. His reasoning that led to the new word was roughly that it had eight points, so ought to start with octo-. He was apparently at that time active in a group that was trying to get the Olympic medals of the athlete Jim Thorpe returned from Sweden, so he decided to add thorpe to the end."

Labels: Entries, Shortcuts

When you type an entry in a ComboBox control Access will attempt to complete the entry based on the control's lookup list. This is controlled by the AutoExpand property, which is set to "Yes" by default.

If your value list contains several items that are close in spelling, it is easy for users to let Access choose the wrong item by accident.

You can avoid errors by setting the control's AutoExpand property to "No" in Design view.

Once the change has been made, users will be forced to type the entire entry or select an item using the ComboBox control's dropdown list.



See all Topics

access

Labels: Entries, Tips

Automatic Input masks

Private Sub Country_AfterUpdate()
Dim strCountry As String
strCountry = Me.Country

    Select Case strCountry
        Case "Canada"
            Me.[PostalCode].InputMask = ">L0L\ 0L0;;_"
        Case "USA"
            Me.[PostalCode].InputMask = "00000-9999;;_"
        Case Else
        'If the country is not Canada or USA no input mask will be used
            Me.[PostalCode].InputMask = ""
    End Select
End Sub

comp.databases.ms-access forum

Working with postal codes in Access

As a rule, if you won't be performing numeric calculations on the data, entries should be stored as text. Social Security numbers, Phone numbers and postal codes should be stored as text.


You can use alphabetic characters in an input mask. For example, one of the sample input masks is >L0L\ 0L0 used to represent a Canadian postal code.

The ">" character in the input mask converts all the characters that follow to uppercase.

The "L" character requires an alpha entry; the "0" (zero) requires a numeric entry.

A "\"character causes the following character to be displayed as a literal character rather than a mask character.

A space appears between the three character pairs.
For example, V5P 2G1 is one valid postal code that the user could enter. The mask would prevent the user from entering two sequential alphabetic characters or numbers.

See:

Trinity University - San Antonio, Texas:
Input mask

Definition characters used to create an input mask
Some validation rules

You can manipulate postal codes in Access by changing the data type, input mask, or format of a postal code field.

Microsoft KB 207829:
ACC2000: How to Manipulate ZIP Codes in Microsoft Access.

Also see:
Postal Codes



See all Topics

access

Labels: Entries, Forms, Macros, VBA

Truncated Numbers

Access has a new option that will show octothorps when the column is too narrow to display the entire value. When this option is not enabled, you see only part of the values in a column rather than ####.

You'll find the selection under Access Options when you click the Office button.
Go to Current Database and make your choice.

See all Topics

access

Labels: Customize, Entries

Better view

With the insertion point in the field, hit: SHIFT+F2.
A Zoom box opens. Enter the formula and hit OK.

BTW: If you enter Field names in the Zoom box without square brackets. If the fields are recognized, Access will add the brackets.



See all Topics

access

Labels: Entries, General, Tips

Nothing's a problem

"When you import data into Microsoft Access, trailing zeros may be lost. This will happen when you import data that is formatted to show these zeros, but where the zeros are not actually part of the data.

For example, in a Microsoft Excel workbook, you can format the number 1234 so that it will be displayed as 1234.000. When you import this workbook into a Microsoft Access table, the number will be displayed as 1234.

This article shows you how to preserve trailing zeros when you import data into Microsoft Access."

How to Preserve Trailing Zeros When Importing Data

Also:
Word — Decimal Point or Trailing Zeros Missing When You Merge Microsoft Access Database

Excel — Using a Custom Number Format to Display Leading Zeros

Zero Padding Numeric Strings

Add leading zeros to numeric strings in Access



See all Topics

access

Labels: Entries, General

Labels and Text boxes

Labels: Entries, Properties