problems with conditional formatting on two conditions

[boerbende]

Dear readers,

I am trying to do a (to me simple) conditional format in my form. But I observe Access hanging in some kind of a loop
- flickering of the form after using two parameters in one condition.
- The bottom line in Access says "calculating".
It only disappears when moving the mouse over those fields
I read this is an known issue, but maybe some workarounds are available?

I have in my table

Description: text
Answer: text
QUESTION: bit

When somebody writes text in Description, he could mark the text as QUESTION which (QUESTION = TRUE)
When somebody reads the question, he can write an answer.

I would like to set in my form a conditional format on the description field
Question = TRUE and isnull(Answer) -> RED background

Like said, I get a flickering form when using two parameters in one condition

Hope somebody knows a solution here

Many thanks

Ben de Boer

 

[Uncle Gizmo]

I noticed you haven't received an answer yet. I wondered, it might be an idea if you copied the form with the problem conditional formatting, and some sample data that demonstrates the conditions you want to find into a sample database and post it on the forum. This would definitely help, me and will probably help others answer your question.

 

[boerbende]

Thanks for your advice. I will look into it.
In the meantime I searched and experimented further. The problem is that it did not seem reproducable, but it certainly was the conditional format. In the meantime I thought I solved the issue (developped under Citrix), but then the day after it was still visible on an standalone computer. With a lot of computing power (Citrix farm) the issue seems to disappear.

Similar conditional formatting reports (flickering, calculating, not updating subform) goes a long way back, I find them since 2000. One of the suggestions was not to combine parameters in the conditional format but in the forms recordset. This is actually my latest test I am running. If this does not work, then I will simplify the CF in the datasheet by using only one parameter.

Regards,

Ben

 

[boerbende]

Some update here. I noticed now this is happening:
- when the conditional format is used in a subform
- when the mousetip is in the subform while the subform refreshes
The message "calculating..." remains in the left under corner
the colors set by the condition formats do appear on some single fields, but not everywhere

As soon as the mouse moves away to the mainform, the conditional format is applied totally and the "calculating..." message disappears

Still don't know what causes this, but I see it happening in many of the databases where I use conditional formats

 

[CJ_London]

nothing to really add at this point but suggest would be helpful if you give a bit of background - what version of access(2003/7/10)? 32/64 bit? file run is .accde/accdb/accdr? what are your conditional formatting rules? typically how many records in the subform? how many controls of the subform have rules?

 

[boerbende]

Hello and thanks for your reply.

It happened with 2007, it happens with 2010. It is a "known" issue by the way, I found similar indications on the internet back to 2000

In my case it happens with only a couple of records in the subform of database 1 up to 40 records in a total other database / subform

Typically what I do with my databases is that I create the recordsource of the subform based on fields in the mainform and set the subform.recordsource in the onload event of the mainform and after an update for example of a date field in the main form.

You can consider the conditional formats in the subform as VERY simple (similar to: if # failures < 3 then background = green, if # failures > 10 then background = red

It appeared to me today that the issue disappears when the mouse is outside the subform area. Maybe I can translate this to a workaround

 

[yupstrips01]

thanks for sharing this useful information.