Moving Within A Program

[MsfStl]

Hi,
I have a delimma and am not sure how to proceed. It falls under the "You want what? When?" category. Basically, I have created an Access program with several (13) related tables and numerous forms. This program mimics an interview we are using for research and has a lot of VBA coding behind it with quite a few skip patterns, value checking, etc. During the testing phase, I was asked to allow the user to be able to go back and check a response to any previous answer at any given point in time. I hear numerous clicks of people running away from this question. This one has me frustrated and not too happy. I am wondering if there is some way I can show a copy of any form and the data contained within it for the present ID? IF it is a copy then the data, I presume would be locked and the user would not be able to change it. Also, I would want to bring the user back to the point where they were prior to going backwards. Feel my pain yet? Of course as I ponder this I can envision that they are going to want to change a value, because maybe a respondent "changed their mind" about a previous question. But, I am sure they would not want to work their way back to where they were, but want to jump back (forward), all the while I need to insure that any skip patterns that may have changed due to a change in data are followed and if a question that was answered before is now skipped then that data needs to be cleaned. I am concerned that as I begin to meander through this issue that I will have "duplicate ID" issues because as I move backward, possibly through several forms and tables and then move forward again the DB will think I am adding two items rather than changing the one. I.e., it will think I have two identical IDs because it already has one from the original pass and as it moves forward and runs through the automated saves that the second pass would represent a duplicate ID, thus crashing the program.
I know this is a multi-pronged question, but I would like to hear some suggestions as to how others with more experience would handle this. I am grateful for your time in reading this and would be even more so for any responses.

Peace!

 

[Sergeant]

My initial thought after reading your post:
For each "survey session", append selected questions to an interim table, all with a GUID for that session.
A form opens, attached to the interim table, filtered dynamically to the GUID that you generated with code (do not allow "addrecords" or "deleterecords"). The user "owns" the filtered recordset from the table while he puts his responses in...can navigate back and forth until satisfied, and then clicks a button "All Finished". This would run an append query to send the records to your main data collection table, and then run a delete query to remove the "temp" records from the interim table (using the GUID as the parameter for each).
Is that the most complicated way to add records to a table, or what?

 

[MsfStl]

Well, that is the problem. Anything I can come up with will require some major coding as far as I can tell. Although, I see what you suggest. I may play around with that on a smaller scale and see if I can come up with a framework to enlarge the scope to encompass the entire program. I thank you for your ideas. If anyone else ahs anything please do not hesitate, I am open to anything, except napalming the office,...too much collateral damage.

 

[MsfStl]

Well, that is the problem. Anything I can come up with will require some major coding as far as I can tell. Although, I see what you suggest. I may play around with that on a smaller scale and see if I can come up with a framework to enlarge the scope to encompass the entire program. I thank you for your ideas. If anyone else ahs anything please do not hesitate, I am open to anything, except napalming the office,...too much collateral damage.