Import records but not entire table

[thompson]

Is there a way to import the records from another database table? I have an inventory database, blank, only the backend data is there. So everyone goes out on their own and gets inventory. At the end of the day, I would like to get flie 1, file 2, file 3, and only open file one, and only import the record from the other two inventory tables.

All these files will be exactly the same(Tables, queries,forms, everything). The only thing that will be different will be the data in the inventory table. Thanks for you help!

 

[The_Doc_Man]

This sounds a bit dangerous only because of the possibility of messing up things like autonumber fields that won't know or care about each other's existence. So they'll potentially have the same values. Not good. Decidedly not good. Because anything ELSE that depended on the value in the autonumber field would then have conflicts to manage. Like, if there were a parent/child relationship involving this table you wanted to import, you would have to recompute a new number for the entries in the master version of the table. Which means you would have to use some other way to identify element ID numbers.

Also the issue of double-update entries becomes a problem. You have to empty the tables in the alternate copies once you have imported them to your master copy. Otherwise, the next time you update the master, you double-dip the data in the child DB unless it gets removed.

However, you can define the "master" DB to link to the tables in the other DBs if they never move with respect to their network pathing. So it is not as if it was impossible. Look up External Tables in the Help Files.

 

[Pat Hartman]

I would suggest not using separate copies of the data. Have each local copy of the db link to a shared back end data database on the network. If this is not possible, use replication. You are attempting to write your own replication code. It has already been written. It takes some care to set up but will be easier and the result will be more robust than something you slap together yourself.

Search for replication in help and in the kb and MSDN for useful reading.