Generat a coutom Data Type for PO

[Darkatoms]

Hi. I'm a noob so take it easy on me.




I have been given the task to create a purchase order DB. The issue I have is generating the PO Number.

What they want is the Year (to auto update when it changes) - Department - Number (Auto Generate) Example 2015-IT-0502



I have tried a few thing but can not work it out. Looked through many forums and not working in DBs I am struggling and don't really know what to look for.

Any help wood be appreciated

[orange]

What exactly is a purchase order database?

Does it deal with Customers?, Suppliers?, Purchases? Products? Services?
Does it involve Stock Control, Inventory Management, ReOrder Points?,ReOrder Quantity, Product Substitutions?

If any of these is relevant, you might want to watch this 26 minute youtube video.

It should help you to get your materials and priorities together based on a real application.

Good luck with your project.

[ItsMe]

I would probably create a separate column for each part. One column for the year, one for the department or ?, and one for the number.

Maybe use a separate table dedicated to storing the PO that is intended for human consumption. So, Primary Key column and three other columns.

[Darkatoms]

The purchase order database is for tracking orders and creating the PO. The only thing I an stuck on is creating the PO Number; Year (to auto update when it changes) - Department - Number (Auto Generate) Example 2015-IT-0502

[ssanfu]

What you are looking for is "Custom Autonumbers". There are scads of articles on how to do this.

Here is one method: http://baldyweb.com/CustomAutonumber.htm

2 example dBs here: http://www.utteraccess.com/forum/Cus...-t1953743.html

[Darkatoms]

Sweet. Thanks. I will have a go and see what happens

[Darkatoms]

I have entered in the Default Value =Year(Date()) & "-IT-" & [ID] . Only thing that is not working is grabbing the number from the ID field.

The error is "The database engine does not recognize either the field 'ID' in a validation expression, or the default value in the table 'PO Reg'

[ssanfu]

My comments:

** "ID" is a poor field name.

** I would NOT use the Default property - I would use the Form Before Update event to generate the "PO Number".

** Depending on what method you are using (one field or 3 fields for the PO Number) to increment the "ID" number, you might have to use a UDF or DLookup() to get the current number and increment it.


And what do you want to happen when the year changes? Start at 1 again or continue incrementing the number?