Hi,

I watched all beginner videos and i was able to work out some table/forms usable for my work. I don't know much about visual basic.

So far i'm working with a "projects" table that has some informations and a "technical drawing table" that are linked to each project. I wish to make automatically a report (identification sheet) from the infos i got with the projects/drawings. I used a query to bank the informations of the last drawing added. Then i simply use a button : Report --- Send report in a file.

Q: Is there a way to save that report automatically into a table field (in my drawing table)?

Q: In the maccro options of the button, at the name of the file to be save (in format PDF), is there a way to add one of the field in the name (to make it save automatically ex : this is drawing #3, have the name automatically be : Identification_[drawing#]?

Q: Is there a way to combine two PDF files in a table to have only 1 PDF and being able to print it/send it by mail (ex : field 1 = identification, field 2= drawing and have the field 3 be : indentification + drawing.pdf) by simply pressing a button?

I'm looking for easy ways to make it work since im terrible at visual basics. Also if you had some tutorial about visuals basics or my questions are covered into your more advanced tutorial, let me know!

Thanks!

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Reply from Richard Rost:

We're going to have to clarify some terms before I can answer your question. First, you can't save a "report" into a "table." A table is what you store your data in. A report displays that data from the table in a specific format. So please clarify what you mean by your first question.

Next, any time you say you want to have something be done "automatically" that almost always involves SOME kind of event programming - either a macro or some VBA code. Yes, it's possible to generate an automatic ID or name for a field. Yes, it will involve some programming. See this tutorial on incrementing your own counter.

As far as saving PDF files in your table, YES you can do that, but I recommend against it unless they're VERY small and/or you don't have very many of them. It's almost always better to keep them as files in a folder and just point to them with a reference (store the file path and name in a text field). I talk about this in detail in my Access Imaging Seminar - the same concept applies for images.

Access is very powerful, and can do a LOT of stuff... and you don't NEED to know any VBA programming to make great databases... but any time you want to automate something or have Access make decisions, it's going to involve SOME kind of event programming.