Form confusion

[mattpuk]

Hello Everyone,

I am hoping you can help me with my :banghead: problem. I am a super newbie to access.

I work in Business Crime and am trying to get a small database together to track offenders. We previously used a spreadsheet but I want to use a relational database to get a little more than pretty line graphs and pie charts.

I currently have 5 tables.

Incidents, Offenders, Reporters, Victims and a join table between Offenders/Incidents. The reason for the join table was that many offenders could be involved in an incident and an offender could have multiple incidents assigned to them.

Now my problem has arisen with creating a form for my Incidents table. If I were only adding one offender it would work perfect and I would be less grey I am sure. However, I need to let the inputting select multiple offenders (obviously each offender has a key) by name in the Incident form to assign that incident against the offender.

I have been trying in between other work to get it functioning but am plumb out of ideas.

I am hoping that someone here maybe able to help me out.

I've put a copy of the relationships on the post as well.

 

[AlexN]

Hi,
First of all why haven't you done the same with reporters as well, while, as one can easily assume, it's possible to have multiple reporters related to multiple incidents.

I think the best way to approach the solution would be to have a combobox in your form for inputting offenders, that would allow multiple values. Check your control properties to see if possible.

Another approach would be to have a subform for offenders, in a main form for Incidents.

Of course that's an amateurs idea. Don't rely on it eyes closed. Should hear form the experts also.

Regards.

 

[jdraw]

I recommend you start with a clear description in plain English of WHAT your database is about. It might also be helpful to readers and yourself if you wrote a brief description of each of the tables you have.
Then, create the underlying business rules, along the lines of:
1 Incident can involve 1 or more Victims
1 Victim can be involved in 1 or More Incidents
1 Incident can involve 1 or more Offenders
...... whatever makes sense in your "business". It is these rules that will identify your relationships between tables.

The big secret here is to get the problem/opportunity described in its entirety before getting too involved in Access.

 

[mattpuk]

Ok, I'll try to be a little more clear.

- An incident is reported to us by a single business.

- They will report basic details, including details of the offender when they have it and a picture at minimum.

- The intention is to track offenders over the course of the year.

- We will also analyse their offending profile by looking at their pattern around likely victims, times, days, ect

- An offender may have multiple incidents against their profile

- Multiple offenders may be assigned to an incident

- A reporter may report many incidents

- A victim may also be reported on many incidents

I had hoped to look at things like clothing to be assigned to offenders and target types assigned to offenders but I need to get this very basic database sorted first.

 

[jdraw]

From experience or analysis do you have a starting list of Offences or IncidentTypes?
It could be useful in categorizing incidents.

 

[mattpuk]

I had thought about having a dedicated list of offences, but wasn't sure how to add multiple offences.

 

[jdraw]

Here is a link to a free data model related to Offenders. This is a generic model, some or most of which may not apply to your situation. It is intended as a starting point or a template to show how some pieces "fit together".

Attached is a sample model for consideration.

Good luck with your project.

 

[mattpuk]

Jdraw you are simply amazing. When I am back to work on Monday I am jumping straight on this!