Report showing numbers instead of text...

[CarlettoFed]

In the attachment you can see a different way of managing data filter and reports.

ExpensesNew.zip

[Frankie]

OK... between bits and pieces here, and some other things I researched online... I got it done. I was told almost EVERYWHERE that using lookups in tables is "BAD." I wanted to do this right, so I wanted to get rid of look ups in tables. Which some of you had mentioned, but as someone who hadn't made a database in 20 years, the process was foreign to me. Some of you knew what to do, and told me, but didn't get specific as to how and where I needed to accomplish this. I played around and found them. Here is what I did. I got rid of all relationships between list tables (look ups) and data storage tables. I then went to my data storage tables in design view, and found on the bottom (yes, I needed to know where to go to accomplish all the great recommendations people were giving me, because again... newbie) on properties and changed any field that was combo box to text. I then changed data type on design of table from number to short text. With this done, any form that drew a list on a combo box from a look up (list table), I made a new combo box directly on the form where I just entered in options to list on form combo box manually, thus eliminating all look ups! Whew. For future reference, anyone who is a newbie will need to know where exactly to go to change things: data types, combo box to text, deleting relationships. I mean, with some time, I eventually found all I needed, but could have saved myself a heap of time if I knew. Either way...thanks all! One final question... which I will post in another forum topic:

Look up tables are nice with convenience of added another record to table, therefore, any place that uses that look up table, will populate with new record as option. If I have combo box on two separate forms, that both were manually filled with same list, if I ever need to add to that list, do I have to go to both forms separately and update list? Seems redundant. Is there an easier way?

Thanks all.
One happy camper.

[June7]

However, you have traded one bad practice for 2 others. You changed fields to text and are therefore saving descriptive text instead of a key from lookup table. You hard-coded list in combobox RowSource instead of using a lookup table as source.

Easier way is to use lookup table as source for combobox list. Need to add a new item - just enter a record in table, otherwise, yes will have to modify forms.

Nobody said here to not use lookup tables, we said don't build lookup fields in table. Build comboboxes on form that use lookup tables as RowSource.

Did you look at your modified database that Mike provided?

[mike60smart]

Well One Happy Camper

You are not listening to what we are saying.
Have you even looked at the example I uploaded?

The fields in the Table where you want to store the values must be set as Number and NOT Text

[Micron]

type in my own entries

By that do you mean when editing the table field it is bound to, or typing in your own list values?
Assuming the latter, that's known as a value list. Easy but if you need new values you must open form in design to edit the list. Typically, list rows (combo row source property) come from queries (preferred IMO) or tables. Note that bound combos on forms are fine for creating a record but can be 'dangerous' to use when viewing records. If someone pokes around in the combos and changes a value, that becomes part of the new record, like it or not. If you are the only db user and understand this then you know not to play around with old values. Otherwise it might be a good idea to show existing records to novice users in a way that doesn't allow them to be edited.