Choose next in sequence

[bikermo]

I would like to know if anyone knows of a way to automatically choose next in sequence via form entry in Access 2007.

We currently have an excel spreadsheet tracking who attends review meetings for new products. There are 12 people who are eligible to attend the meeting, and the next person in the sequence should be chosen when a new meeting is scheduled. I'll be adding this to an existing database with an "associate" table- where each associate name is assigned a numeric value so that should help, if this can even be done.

The problem is that the logical order may not always be followed. Associate 8 might be up next but be on vacation, so Associate 9 is sent in their place. We can't skip over Assoc. 8 completely so we'll go back to them once they're back in the office, but we don't want 9 being sent to the next one after that again. Or the manager might determine one associate has more knowledge in the area of the new product being presented and send them out of order. In Excel it's easy to see who is up or who has been skipped, but in single-form data entry in Access the pattern won't be visible.

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance-

 

[spikepl]

You list a number of logical conditions (and there might be more) that the sequencing must fulfil.Full automation of this would require keeping tabs on history, absence, relative suitability etc etc etc all things that skilled meatware managed to perform manually in Excel. Why do you wish to automate something that so evidently needs meatware and not just software?

In Excel it's easy to see who is up or who has been skipped

If the above is your only reason, then I would suggest that you simply display the assigment and the history, so that whoever is to make the decision about the next assignment has all the info required

 

[bikermo]

uh, because i don't know of any other way to do it besides what we are already doing- physically looking at a list that tells us who can be chosen and who is next, and after assignment physically changing the list, putting the most recently chosen at the bottom and putting the "next up" name in another cell.

and i have no clue what metaware is, besides google telling me it's a company but i'm fairly certain that's not what you meant.

 

[gemma-the-husky]

i think as spike says

if you automate it, then clearly you remove user interaction.

if you allow user overrides, then you are back to the same as before, although you can probably present it a bit nicer in access.

and managing temporary allocations that might get overridden and changed later sounds horrendous. why bother. if you give the next slot to number 9, and later number 8 comes back to the list - why can he not just get the next slot.

it might not just be number 9 - presumably you could have allocated 9,10,and 11 before number 8 came back. Are you going to change all of them? At what point is it too late to change. It's all doable, but the harder the business rules, the harder it will get to code.

 

[bikermo]

Ok, so it can't truly be automated, but it still needs tweaking from Excel to Access.

Because we'll be entering the data in single form view, I think what I need to do is run a very simple query or report to show the history and give the person entering the next record a recommendation on who's up next.