Strange behaviour of a "memo" type text box

[BruceUK]

Hello,

I have a form containing a large text box that can accept an extended amount of text running to hundreds of characters. It is used as a typing exercise for trainee secretarial staff. The form is displayed repeatedly for a different displayed text to be entered each time.

Normally there is no input mask for this text box. However, at randomly selected points, the text has to be entered without the trainee being able to see what is being entered, so the input mask is dynamically set to "PASSWORD" in VBA code. If the next entry reverts to "normal" input, the input mask is reset to "". The

In testing this, I've discovered that, when the input mask is "PASSWORD", there is a maximum limit of 255 characters that can be entered. The problem I'm having is that, if the input mask has been reset to "" for a normal entry after the previous entry was masked, the text box is STILL accepting only 255 characters.



The code I'm using is quite simple. Essentially it looks like this:

If blnVBAMaskedInputRequiredForNext Entry Then
Me.txtEnteredText.InputMask = "PASSWORD"
Else
Me.txtEnteredText.InputMask = ""
End If

Can anyone suggest what I can do to correct this problem? Any ideas would be much appreciated!

[warmslime]

I just tried it myself and I'm not seeing this behavior. I made a form with an unbound textbox and put two buttons, one that sets the input mask to password and one that sets it to "". It indeed doesn't let me enter more than 255 characters as a password, however when I switch to no input mask it lets me enter them just fine. In fact if I switch to password after having entered more than 255 characters and then switch back to no input mask, it saves the extra characters.
I think the problem is in your table field properties. Mind attaching an empty copy of the database?

[John_G]

A quick fix to this would be to just format the text box as white text on white background when you want the user to enter text "blindly". That won't affect how many characters can be entered.

[BruceUK]

A quick fix to this would be to just format the text box as white text on white background when you want the user to enter text "blindly". That won't affect how many characters can be entered.

That's a very neat solution - it works fine! A great example of "thinking out of the box".

Many thanks John!