email form, email, get input, email back

[Who Cares!]

Help! I have a Work Order in Access that I need to partially filled
out in the office and then email it to a Pocket PC phone (or??) and
then have my tech fill in some of the blanks (hours, parts, etc.) and
email it back to me. Then I need to re-insert it into my database so
I can finish processing it.

Is this possible without a massive programming effort? Using the
standard operations of Windows is not a problem.

Dave Lagergren
CCG

dave who is at ccgroup.us

 

[LeAnne]

Hi Dave,

A Form has no independent existence outside of the Access environment;
it's mainly a user interface. Think of it as a "window" to your database
tables: through a window, you can view information stored in tables;
and you can pass information through a window to be stored in tables.
But the form itself doesn't store data. You can create a *Report* that
you could then export as a .txt or .doc file for distribution, or email
directly to your tech (search the OLH for "Attach an object's output to
an electronic mail message"). However, once the graphical image or
document file has been exported to an external source, it longer has any
linkages to the db structure. So once your tech has filled in the blanks
& sent the file back, I'm pretty sure you can't re-import the Report
back into Access. Even if you could, Access couldn't "see" the data,
because data don't reside in Reports...they reside in Tables. So
anything that your tech added manually in the exported version would
have to be manually entered into the database by you.

I'm not saying that there is no way to accomplish what you want (via
code). But it would likely be a massively unpleasant undertaking.

hth,

LeAnne

 

[PC Datasheet]

Dave,

If you do this on a routine basis, it can be totally automated. As
LeAnnepointed out, an Access form is not the way to do it. Rather you export
the WorkOrder data into an Excel template and email the template to your
tech. He then completes the data in the template and emails you the template
back. The final step is for you to import the data in the template into your
database. It's not a "massive programming effort" but takes some know-how
and work. I have done a few of these and could do it for you if you need
help doing it. Email me at my email address below if you want my help.