Advice on Multi Value Field

[ToddNYC]

I'd like to add a multi-value combobox to my database. I understand I want to avoid table-lookups, so I'd like to add it to my form, but can't figure out how. I've been unable to locate a post in this forum or an article/tutorial on line, and there is nothing in my book. I must be searching using the wrong terminology. Can anyone direct me to an article or post that might help me figure out the best way to execute this?

Thank you!



Todd

[ketbdnetbp]

ToddNYC -

Don't know if this will help but, try a search on:

Multi Select Combo Boxes

or

Multi Value Fields

All the best,

Jim

[pbaldy]

I personally wouldn't use that type at all. Partly because you can't upsize it, but also the reasons given here:

http://allenbrowne.com/Access2007.html#Mixed

[ToddNYC]

Thanks Paul. Can you tell me the best way to approach this task: I have a table of several thousand events. Each event has one (or more) of maybe 25 categories it falls into. (For example: Music, Dance, etc.) I'd like to be able to select the applicable event types and ultimately I need to feed it out as one field to another program in the form of "'Event Name', 'Music;Dance'".

Similarly, each event also has other descriptors, such as "Time of Day" where I would want to select one or more of the three options "morning", "afternoon" or "evening".

Can you advise me how to approach to capture the data in a way to export it as described above while still following best practices?

[pbaldy]

Well, I wasn't saying "don't do it" so much as "be aware of the limitations". The normalized structure would be a many-to-many junction table. You can represent it with a list box or subform. Getting the data out as you describe is fairly simple with a function like:

Return a concatenated list of sub-record values

http://allenbrowne.com/func-concat.html