Tables - linking columns

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Mike B - 18 Apr 2005 23:39 GMT

I have a huge database, many many tables. what i need to do seems to be a
reletively small job, but i am pulling out my hair over this. I have a table
containing stock details, and another table containing supplier details. In
my stock table, i have a column (named supplier id)which is already linked to
the same column in the supplier table. I did not do this, it was done through
a third party application. Now what i am trying to do is this: I have created
a column in the stock table and named it 'supplier', the same column in the
supplier table contains the suppliers company name. i want the supplier table
to put the data in this column into the same column in 'stock'. If you have
any questions, please ask, and i will answer them 2 the best of my abilities.
I am desperate, and have not been able to get help for this. Cheers

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Nikos Yannacopoulos - 19 Apr 2005 07:32 GMT

Mike,

Although what you are asking is easy (all it takes is an update query),
you should *not* do it. The whole idea of relational databases and data
normalization is that no piece of data is duplicated. Since you already
have the supplier ID field in your stock table, you can pull the
supplier name at runtime anytime, anywhere you may need it (in a form,
report...) either by means of including the suppliers table in the
recordsource, or by just looking it up.

HTH,
Nikos

> I have a huge database, many many tables. what i need to do seems to be a
> reletively small job, but i am pulling out my hair over this. I have a table
[quoted text clipped - 7 lines]
> any questions, please ask, and i will answer them 2 the best of my abilities.
> I am desperate, and have not been able to get help for this. Cheers

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Mike - 20 Apr 2005 22:10 GMT

Okay, I know what you mean, That is basically what i did. The thing is, i
actually needed different columns from a couple table in one. I was playing
around with it yesterday, and created a query with all the parts i wanted in
the 1, and didnt realise until soon after, that this query can be exported as
a table, csv etc. Thankyou, much appreciate your reply, if i wasn't so
desperate to make it work, i would have left it until today, and been behind
in my work. Cheers - Mike.

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Nikos Yannacopoulos - 21 Apr 2005 08:31 GMT

Mike,

You did the right thing! That's exactly the idea.

Regards,
Nikos

> Okay, I know what you mean, That is basically what i did. The thing is, i
> actually needed different columns from a couple table in one. I was playing
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
> desperate to make it work, i would have left it until today, and been behind
> in my work. Cheers - Mike.

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