Importing but not Duplicating

[tanyalee123]

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

To populate the main table of my database, I receive an Excel file. This file lists ALL of our members. I have loaded this spreadsheet into my database; however, each month I will receive another Excel file that lists ALL of our members. Of course, all I need is the new members that are not already in my database. It is very important that I don't overwrite existing members because I may have entered additional data about those members since they were loaded. I also, of course, don't want duplicates of the members in my db.

How do I only get the data that is not already in my db? (my unique field is social security number, so I need to somehow tell it that I only need unique SSN's from the spreadsheet). Not a clue how to do this!

Thank you for any assistance. Let me know if you need anymore information.



Tanya

[RuralGuy]

I'm going to suggest importing the Excel file into a separate table and then using the Find Unmatched Query Wizard to locate the new records.

[tanyalee123]

Thank you RuralGuy, I will test that out. That seems like a straighforward way to do it!

[RuralGuy]

Straightforward is good!
Post back here if you're still having trouble.

[Todd84]

I am hoping to do the same thing but with a bulk set of about 1000 txt files. I am planning on doing this through VBA.

Here is the pseudo-code

for every file in specific directory
upload file into access table with the same name as the file
use the query wizard to de-dupe the entries
re-order the items with highest ID at the top

I am OK at using logic to figure out a code. Any reference to a post with the VBA would be great.

The searching has been tough.

[ItsMe]

Why do you need 1000 tables? Do you already have a unique table to match each of these text files?

[ssanfu]

@Todd84
Welcome to the form.

One point on etiquette. By asking a question on someone else's post, you have done what is called hi-jacking a post. If you have a question, you should start your own thread. If there is a thread that is close to your question, reference the thread that in your post.


It is not hard to import the text files, especially using code. If the text files have the same structure, you can set up an import specification to ensure the data is converted/imported correctly.

So do all of the 1,000 text files have the same field names and order?
What fields are used to identify records as duplicates?


I just wrote some code to import records from 240 files a few days ago....

[Todd84]

Thanks for the pointers! Very excited to share, receive help and give help if I can. I'm done and moving to new post.