file integrity concerns...

K

Kenton MELLOTT

Hi,

My dad works with Access trying to get in order something over 2000
records. He prefers to work with a table directly. In any case, he is
apprehensive, in that he seems to think that records are disappearing or
getting scrambled on him. You don't need to get to specific, yet we are
wondering what file integrity processes are being used to insure the such an
event, particularly when stopping/saving, and restarting things is caught
should it occur? Is there something in the order of a signature or error
checking key for each record, or possibly even each field? I'm almost
certain the file has a summary that notes the basic count and sizes for each
record and the whole.

Your response is appreciated.

Sincerely,

Gregory D. MELLOTT for Kenton W. MELLOTT
 
J

Jerry Whittle

Working directly with a table is asking for trouble. It's possible to delete
multiple records or columns with just a couple of errant clicks or keystokes.

If by scrambled he means that records aren't always in the same order, such
as in an Excel worksheet, that's how tables work. There is no inherent order
of records in a table. If you need them in a certain order, you need to
define a sort order in a query or, better yet, a form.

If records are actually disappearing or getting scrambled such as "ABC" in a
field looking like "&*^", that can be a corruption issue. Compact and Repair
can fix some of these problems.

All integrity checks and such are handled internal to Access. AFAIK there is
no way to readily figure out if a record is messed up. Access doesn't really
have built-in auditing to see if someone changed or deleted a record like
some heavy duty databases such as Oracle.

My experience is that missing or scrambled records are caused by two things:
database corruption or user error. User error is the most common cause
especially when a user 'remembers' typing in a record or field, but really
didn't.

Access basically is a "all your eggs in one basket" system as the data is
usually in just one or two .mdb files. Corruption can destroy the file or
even someone can easily delete the entire database while in Windows Explorer.
At times like this, nothing beats a good backup. I recommend backing up
databases frequently to another physical drive such as burning to a CD/DVD or
copying to a flash drive.
 
G

Gregory MELLOTT

Thanks for your response.
An refined question is in the old message below.

Jerry Whittle said:
Working directly with a table is asking for trouble. It's possible to
delete
multiple records or columns with just a couple of errant clicks or
keystokes.


If by scrambled he means that records aren't always in the same order,
such
as in an Excel worksheet, that's how tables work. There is no inherent
order
of records in a table. If you need them in a certain order, you need to
define a sort order in a query or, better yet, a form.

If records are actually disappearing or getting scrambled such as "ABC" in
a
field looking like "&*^", that can be a corruption issue. Compact and
Repair
can fix some of these problems.

All integrity checks and such are handled internal to Access. AFAIK there
is
no way to readily figure out if a record is messed up. Access doesn't
really
have built-in auditing to see if someone changed or deleted a record like
some heavy duty databases such as Oracle.
Click to expand...

Is it possible to generate values for a field that might be a signature or
key for a record to verify its integrity?
A CRC type entry would likely be enough for size of most records.
How hard is it to have a record field noting when the record was modified
and who was the User at the time [perhaps in an appending fashion]?
 
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