sorting question

[nhpls]

I have a database. There's a sub form with


order #, activity, date, end date

Right now it's sorted by order number which is just a number input. But if someone has a new task or one thing gets started at an earlier date, that goes in the middle, they'll have to rename all other other order numbers. What I need is to order it by date, and if it's there's two activities on the same date have whoever is putting the data in to pick which one goes first.

Any idea about how I would go about this?

Thanks

[pbaldy]

You can base the subform on a query that includes the desired sort, or use the OrderBy property of the form.

[nhpls]

Ok so it orders by date, how do I get that second level of picking which activity from that date is first, second, third etc if there are doubles?

I'm looking up Orderby right now.

[pbaldy]

If you want the second level to be user selectable/maintainable, you need to include a field to save it. Depending on your specifics, I suspect it will get a little tricky, but it's certainly doable.

[nhpls]

How specifically would I do that?
I'm very inexperienced with Access and I haven't been able to get this done all day.

And I do appreciate your very quick responses.

[pbaldy]

Like I said, this could get tricky. If you just want the user to enter a value for each record, it's fairly simple. Add a field called "SortField" or whatever to the table and form, and let the user input a value. Then include that field in your sorting. If you want a Netflix type thing where you change the sort value of a record from 10 to 1 and all the other values change to accomodate that (the existing 1 changes to 2, 2 to 3, etc), that will be tricky.

[nhpls]

Right now it's sorted by order which is just which 1, 2, 3, 4... etc. that the user inputs to show which ones first, 2nd, third instead of by date. The problem is when something gets moved up or down, they have to manual go and change everything else, say move something from 10 to 6, they need to rename the others.

I'm just trying to figure out the simplest way to get rid of their manual work. I guess I could go and remove that order column, add a new one like dupe dates and if a date is duped they input which ones first, and then in query? I make it sort dupe date first then date and get a table from that? I'd have to manual go back and edit the ones already in there correct?