MS Access - SQL append query behavior is erratic - sql

I've been working on an Access database for the last couple weeks, and it's my first project with the tool. Dealing with append queries seems to have become an utter nightmare, and is incredibly frustrating. Even more so because it seems to have simply stopped working in any consistent manner overnight.
The SQL query that I have written goes thus:
PARAMETERS noteDetails LongText, noteTime DateTime, srcUserID Long;
INSERT INTO tblNotes (NOTE_DETAILS, NOTE_TIME_CREATED, NOTE_SOURCE_USER)
VALUES (noteDetails, noteTime, srcUserID)
In tblNotes:
NOTE_ID is an AutoNumber
NOTE_DETAILS is a Long Text
NOTE_TIME_CREATED is a Date/Time
NOTE_SOURCE_USER is a Number
The way that I'm running this query is through VBA:
Set qdf = CurrentDb.QueryDefs("qerApndNote")
qdf.Parameters(0).Value = txtDetails.Value
qdf.Parameters(1).Value = Now()
qdf.Parameters(2).Value = getCurrentUserID()
qdf.Execute dbFailOnError
qdf.Close
Set qdf = Nothing
' Where CurrUserID is a global long
' txtDetails.Value is a textbox's contents
' Now() is the VBA built-in function to return a date/time combo
I have attempted to run this query manually from the navigation bar, and it works fine when done in that manner.
However, running it from VBA has resulted in such things as there being no time / date inserted, sometimes a user ID is not inserted, sometimes both, sometimes even the details text is missing.
What is it that I'm missing? Is there any general advice for users of MS Access to follow that I am not? I'm aware that NOTE is a restricted word in Access, but I really don't think that should apply here, right?
Thanks in advance!
EDIT: The form that I'm passing data from is called frmNewNote, and there is a control in it named txtDetails. It's just a regular textbox. Don't really know what else to share about that.
The getCurrentUserID function is in a module, modGlobal:
Public CurrUserID As Long
Public Function getCurrentUserID() As Long
getCurrentUserID = CurrUserID
End Function
Public Function setCurrentUserID(CurrID As Long)
CurrUserID = CurrID
End Function
It's about as barebones as you can get, really. And there is never a circumstance that you'll get to the form before SetCurrentUserID has been called during your... session? There's a login form involved.
#Andre's code for logging:
0 noteDetailsText This is a note test
1 noteTimeCreated 9/6/2017 10:28:45 AM
2 srcUserID 1
As for my architecture, um, it's just the single database file right now, on the desktop. The entire function/sub is run when you click a button, btnEnter. It does some other stuff before it gets to the SQL statement bit - checks for null values and prompts user for entries if that's the case.

I just remembered something:
MS Access 2013 calling insert queries from VBA with strange errors
You have a LongText parameter. These don't really work. See also https://stackoverflow.com/a/37052403/3820271
If the entered notes will always be <= 255 characters, change the parameter to ShortText.
If the text can be longer, you'll have to use either SunKnight0's approach with a concatenated INSERT statement.
Or use a Recordset and its .AddNew method, which will be a similar amount of code to your current solution, but also be completely safe from injection or formatting issues.

You are doing way more work than you have to. All you need is:
DoCmd.RunSQL("INSERT INTO tblNotes (NOTE_DETAILS, NOTE_TIME_CREATED, NOTE_SOURCE_USER) VALUES ('" & Me.txtDetails & "',Now()," & CurrUserID & ")")
Note the change from txtDetails.Value to Me.txtDetails which is what may have been messing you up. This of course assumes the code runs in the form's context, otherwise you have to get he value of the text field using a reference to the form.
The only other thing to consider is making sure Me.txtDetails does not have any single quotes, so probably use Replace(Me.txtDetails,"'","''") instead.
That way you can also replace DoCmd.RunSQL with MsgBox to troubleshoot the exact query.

Related

How to Pass Multivalued field in query to VBA function

In my project I have a table1 that has an ID and a text field. table2 has a multi-valued field multifield wherein I can select multiple values from table (via lookup).
Now, I have query1 where I want to pull the value from multifield - not multifield.value and pass it to a VBA function, like this: IDsToNames: table2.multifield. Problem is that VBA gives me this error:
The multi-valued field 'table2.multifield` is not valied in the expression IDsToNames(table2.multifield)
Now, I've tried with IDsToNames([table2].[multifield]) with the same results.
Here is my query's SQL:
SELECT table2.Title, table2.multifield, IDstoNames(table2.multifield) AS FieldNames
FROM table2;
If I remove the IDsToNames function from the SQL, then table2.multifield by itself will return the IDs like: 5, 4, 1 properly. I'm trying to fetch the second column of table1 instead of the first one that includes the IDs. So i figured I'd try passing that field to a function and perform a string split and them look them up with dlookup in a loop. But I can't get the field data into the function.
Is there a way to do this?
Is there a way to pass a multivalued field directly to a VBA function from within an SQL statement? No, regrettably.
However, there are various alternative methods that you can implement to get the list of values stored in the field. It's easy to ramble on about the pros and cons of Access multivalued fields. I'm not going to do that in detail, but it is worth stating that the primary benefit of a multivalue field is the convenience and apparent simplicity of the Access interface being able to automatically list and allow selection of multiple values of a one-to-many relationship. Trying to mimic that behavior in Access can be very awkward and cumbersome (and often impossible). Much of the implementation details for the multivalued fields are "hidden" (i.e. not well documented or are not exposed to the standard SQL or VBA programming interfaces). This includes the ability to pass the mutlivalued field to a VBA function from within an SQL statement. Regardless of how intuitive the intended behavior seems, Access will not simply pass the same concatenated list of values that it displays to another function. But there are still times when one simply wants the list of values, made accessible in a simple list. The information linked to by Gustav is useful and should be well understood for querying multivalued fields, but it still does not address other perfectly reasonable actions required for multiple values. Hopefully the following pointers are useful.
If the values are needed within a standard SQL statement, I suggest passing the primary key value(s) to a VBA function. Then have the VBA function look up the record and retrieve the multivalued-field values using DAO recordsets.
Because this will call the VBA function for every row, this can be (very) slow. It is possible to optimize the function using various techniques, like opening a static recordset object. Further details are beyond the scope of this answer.
Since you're already in code at this point and can structure VBA and queries however you want, the most efficient query will circumvent the multivalued-field itself and use standard SQL joins to get what you need. For instance, if you want to get all of the related user names, then open and enumerate the following recordset to build your list of names:
sSQL = "SELECT table2.key, table2.multifield.value, UserTable.Username " & _
" FROM UserTable INNER JOIN table2 ON UserTable.ID = table2.multifield.Value" & _
" WHERE (table2.key = [KeyParameter])"
Set qry = CurrentDb.CreateQueryDef(, sSQL)
qry.Parameters("KeyParameter") = keyPassedToFunction
Set rs = qry.OpenRecordset
If the SQL query can/will be opened as a DAO recordset in a code context and you still need to retrieve the multivalued-field as a single field, there is a way to enumerate the multivalued-field in VBA.
If the code ends up repeatedly opening and closing multiple recordsets, especially in multiple nested loops, it is likely that you could improve efficiency by restructuring the SQL using appropriate joins and changing the data processing order.
Rant: As you might notice, it is somewhat inconsistent that the underlying recordset object of an SQL statement does indeed return an object which can be enumerated in code, although the Access SQL engine refuses to pass such an object to a VBA function. The SQL engine already deals with boxing and unboxing data into the VBA variant type, so it seems reasonable that when implementing the multivalue fields, they could have had the SQL engine simply box the multivalued recordset object and passed it to a VBA function to be handled similar to the following code... so the original attempt in the question was not unreasonable.
The following code snippet illustrates that the multivalue field is returned as a DAO.Field object containing a DAO.Recordset2 object:
Dim rs as Recordset2
Set rs = CurrentDB.OpenRecordset("SELECT table2.multifield ... FROM ...")
Dim sList As String
sList = ""
If TypeOf rs![multifield] Is Recordset2 Then
Dim rsMVF As Recordset2
Set rsMVF = rs![multifield]
Dim bFirst As Boolean
bFirst = True
rsMVF.MoveFirst
Do Until rsMVF.EOF
If bFirst Then
sList = rsMVF.Fields(0)
bFirst = False
Else
sList = sList & "," & rs.Fields(0)
End If
rsMVF.MoveNext
Loop
'* DO NOT CLOSE the Recordset based on the Multivalue field.
'* Access will close it automatically.
End If
'* sList will contain comma-separated list of values

Is there a way in VBA to iterate through specific objects on a form?

I would like to have a subroutine in VBA that conditionally changes the Enabled property of each of 20+ buttons on a form via iteration rather than code them all by hand. These buttons are named similar to tables that they process. For example: A table to process is called "CUTLIST"; its corresponding button is called "but_CUTLIST". There is another table that holds the list of tables to be processed (used for iteration purposes in other subs).
What I have so far...
Private Sub txt_DataSet_GotFocus()
Dim sqlQry as String
Dim butName As String
Dim tableList As Recordset
Dim tempTable As Recordset
Set tableList = CurrentDb.OpenRecordset("TableList") 'names of tables for user to process
tableList.MoveFirst 'this line was corrected by moving out of the loop
Do Until tableList.EOF
sqlQry = 'SQL query that determines need for the button to be enabled/disabled
Set tempTable = CurrentDb.OpenRecordset(sqlQry)
If tempTable.RecordCount > 0 Then
'begin code that eludes me
butName = "but_" & tableList!tName
Me(butName).Enabled False
'end code that eludes me
End If
tableList.MoveNext
Loop
End Sub
If I remember correctly, JavaScript is capable of calling upon objects through a variable by handling them as elements of the document's object "array." Example: this[objID]=objVal Is such a thing possible with VBA or am I just going about this all wrong?
Viewing other questions... is this what's called "reflection"? If so, then this can't be done in VBA. :(
In case more explanation helps to answer the question better... I have a utility that runs SQL queries against a pre-defined set of tables. Each table has its own button, so that the user may process a query against any of the tables as needed. Depending on circumstances happening to data beforehand, any combination of the tables may need to be queried via pressing of said buttons. Constantly referring to the log, to see what was already done, gets cumbersome after processing several data sets. So, I'd like to have the buttons individually disable themselves if they are not needed for the currently focused data set. I have another idea on how to make that happen, but making this code work would be faster and I would learn something.
I'm not an expert on VBA, but I would re-arrange the code to take advantage of the fact that you can iterate through the control collection in the user form
Something like this:
Dim ctrl as Control
For Each ctrl in UserForm1.Controls
If TypeName(ctrl) = "Button" Then
ctrl.Enabled = True
End If
Next
You can pass the button name to some other function (from this loop) to determine whether the button in question should be enabled / disabled.

Access Call Macro from Query (Opening a Form) Run-time error '2486': You can't carry out this action at the present time

I have an Access Query that requiers a value to be set in a combo-box within a form in order to work
Criteria: Forms![_SelectCustomer]![CmbSelectCustomer]
So far so good, however, I would like the query to open, read and close this form programatically when it is run using a macro.
I have been following #David-W-Fenton's answer in THIS similar stack overflow question and have come up with the following code:
Public Function rtnSelectCustomer() As Variant
DoCmd.OpenForm "_SelectCustomer", , , , , acDialog
With Forms![_SelectCustomer]
If .Tag <> "Cancel" Then
rtnSelectCustomer = Nz(!CmbSelectCustomer, "*")
Else
rtnSelectCustomer = "*"
End If
End With
Close acForm, "_SelectCustomer"
End Function
I call this function from within the criteria field of the property I want to filter by in the Query:
Like rtnSelectCustomer()
At this point I run into several problems:
The first being, I'm not sure where to place the actual code: I can't seem to create a specific class or module for my query within the "Microsoft Access Class Objects" folder so I have resorted to creating my own module within the Modules folder. (Is this the correct approach?)
The second issue is that when I run the query with the code in the current module I have created I get the following error:
Run-time error '2486':
You can't carry out this action at the present time.
Any advice would be much appreciated
Edit:
I should clarify that after further testing the line that seems to cause the Run-time error is the following:
DoCmd.OpenForm "_SelectCustomer", , , , , acDialog
The function is actually called as replacing the internal code with the following does actually work (although is admittedly useless)
Public Function rtnSelectCustomer() As Variant
rtnSelectCustomer
End Function
Generally, I hate things that are "pre-programmed" by Microsoft, I'd rather do them myself. It seems this is your case as well...
I would do this in 2 steps.
Step1: Show things to the user as if the query was running (without actually running it) and store the values the user picks.
Step2: Use the values to parameterize the query
If your function works well, then simply remember what the user picks and then do:
set qdf = new QueryDef
' set the qdf and add all parameters to it
DoCmd.Execute qdf
for further reference on how QueryDef works I would use this msdn site

How to send a query string from function

I'm having a hard time coming up with a good title, but i hope i can explain the situation better. I currently have a query with a criteria which is ("11:00 - 21:00" Or "11:01 - 21:00"), this works perfectly fine when executed, however i will need this criteria in multiple queries therefore i decided to come up with function like below
Function timeIntervals()
timeIntervals = "11:00 - 21:00" & " Or " & "11:01 - 21:00"
End Function
and call it in each query, therefore each time i require to modify this string i can do it through that one instance, however when running this string above it does not function, im assuming its caused by the quotes on the Or, ive tried triple quotes """ and chr(34), however it doesn't work, can someone suggest a work around thank you!
As Remou indicated, you won't be able to get this to work. If you really want to do the check via a VBA function, you could write something like this:
Function timeIntervals(Value) As Boolean
If Value = "11:00 - 21:00" Or Value = "11:01 - 21:00" Then
timeIntervals = True
End If
End Function
Pass the value you want to check, and if the resulting function is true you then display the row. Something like: where timeIntervals(myvalue) = true.
Probably the best solution though is to make a table for the timeIntervals. Then in your query simply write something like:
Where MyValue IN(Select timeValue from timeIntervals)
Using this latter method you can update the table which will update the results for all users, and doesn't require a re-release of your front-end.
No matter what you do with quotes, that is not going to work, because Or will be returned as a string, not the boolean Or that you want. You could use a hidden form with two textboxes, then you can say:
WHERE timeIntervals = Forms!MyForm!Text1 Or Forms!MyForm!Text2
as long as the form remains open, your queries and any forms or reports based on them will work, furthermore, it will be very easy to change the intervals without modifying code.

Access VBA with custom function in SQL

I need to open a query or recordset or something (datasheet view) with some sql i build in my vba based on form control values. I have a "many to many" relationship in my data (kind of). Pretend we have a Person table, a Pet table and an ID Pet_Person table. I want to have a list of my People with a concatenated string of all their pets in one row of returned data. So....
Row Person Pets
1 Kim Lucius, Frodo, Cricket, Nemo
2 Bob Taco
And I googled and I found you can write functions in the VBA to be called from the SQL. So. Here's the problem. I have a lot of records and once opened, I cannot move around the datasheet view/query/whatever without that concatenation function being called everytime I click on a row. I only need it called once when the sql is initially ran... like a snapshot or something.
I'm not too well versed with Access and the possibilities. I've tried some things I found online that all had the same result... that concatenation function being called when I touched that resulting dataset at all.
Last thing I tried looks something like:
With db
Set qdf = .CreateQueryDef("Search Results", q)
DoCmd.OpenQuery "Search Results", , acReadOnly
.QueryDefs.Delete "Search Results"
End With
StackOverflow really never formats my stuff correctly. Probably user error.... oh, well.
Edit:
Oh Bart S. Thank you but you went away too soon for me to understand the answer if it is there. Thank you.
Oh Remou. Yes, I saw your post. I used your post. I've used many of your posts while working on this project. Why access doesn't support all SQL functions I am so used to with MySQL I have no idea. You're a great addition to this site. I should have linked to it with my question but the coffee hadn't kicked in yet.
I have my concatenation function and I am calling it within the sql. I was opening it with the docmd to open that recorset or query or whatever. But here is my issue (and I may be creating this myself by trying too many solutions at once or I might be overlooking something)... it keeps calling that function each time I touch the resulting dataset/query/thing and there's too much data for that to be happening; I am seeing the hourglass simply too much. I am positive this is because of the way I am opening it. This is intended to be the result of a search form screen thing. I'm thinking I need to just literally make another form in access and populate it with my resulting recordset. I think that is what you guys are telling me. I'm not sure. This is a weird example. But... you know with Excel, when you write an inline function of some kind to get some value for each row... and then you do a copy and paste special for just values (so not the function)... I need that. Because this function (not in Excel, obviously) must query and that takes to long to reapply each time a row is clicked on (I think it's actually requerying each row if a single row is clicked on, almost like it's rerunning the sql or something). Like the NIN/Depeche Mode song Dead Souls... It keeps calling me/it.
Here are a few thoughts and strategies for coping with the issue of constant data re-loading:
Make sure your query is set to snapshot. Same for the form.
This of course makes the data read-only, but it may help a bit.
Cache the result of your query into a local table, then show/bind that table instead of the query itself.
This will make the user wait a bit longer initially while the query is executed and saved into the local table, but it makes the interface much smoother afterwards since all data is local and doesn't need to be re-calculated.
Create a local table localPetResult (on the client side) that has all the fields matching those of the query.
Instead of binding the query itself to the datasheet form, bind the localPetResult to it, then in the form's VBA module handle the OnLoad event:
Private Sub Form_Load()
' Remove all previous data from the local cache table '
CurrentDb().Execute "DELETE FROM localPetResult"
' Define the original query '
Dim q as String
q = q & "SELECT Row, "
q = q & " Person, "
q = q & " Coalesce(""SELECT PetName FROM Pets WHERE Person='"" & [Person] & ""',"","") AS PetNames "
q = q & "FROM MyData"
' Wrap the query to insert its results into the local table '
q = "INSERT INTO localPetResult " & q
' Execute the query to cache the data '
CurrentDb().Execute q
End Sub
One you have it working, you can improve on this in many ways to make it nicer (freeze the screen and display the hourglass, dynamically bind the ersult table to the form after the data has been calculated, etc)
Cache the result of each call to the coalescing function.
I've used that to calculate the concatenation once for each record, then store the result in a Dictionary whose key is the ID of the record. Subsequent calculations for the same ID are just pulled from the Dictionary instead of re-calculated.
For instance, add the following to a VBA module. I'll assume that you use Remou's Coalesce function as well.
Option Compare Database
Option Explicit
' A Scripting.Dictionary object we'll use for caching '
Private dicCache As Object
' Call to initialise/reset the cache before/after using it '
Public Sub ResetCoalesceCache()
If Not (dicCache Is Nothing) Then
dicCache.RemoveAll
End If
End Sub
' Does the Same as Coalesce() from Remou, but attempts to '
' cache the result for faster retrieval later '
Public Function Coalesce2(key As Variant, _
sql As String, _
sep As String, _
ParamArray NameList() As Variant) As Variant
' Create the cache if it hasn't been initialised before '
If dicCache Is Nothing Then
Set dicCache = CreateObject("Scripting.Dictionary")
End If
If IsNull(key) Then
' The key is invalid, just run the normal coalesce '
Coalesce2 = Coalesce(sql, sep, NameList)
ElseIf dicCache.Exists(key) Then
' Hurray, the key exists in the cache! '
Coalesce2 = dicCache(key)
Else
' We need to calculate and then cache the data '
Coalesce2 = Coalesce(sql, sep, NameList)
dicCache.Add(key, Coalesce2)
End If
End Function
Then, to use it in your query:
' first clear the cache to make sure it doesn't contain old '
' data that could be returned by mistake '
ResetCoalesceCache
' Define the original query '
Dim q as String
q = q & "SELECT Row, "
q = q & " Person, "
q = q & " Coalesce2([Row], ""SELECT PetName FROM Pets WHERE Person='"" & [Person] & ""',"","") AS PetNames "
q = q & "FROM MyData"
' Bind to your form or whatever '
...
I always do it like this:
Dim strSql As String
strSql = "SELECT * FROM table WHERE field=something;"
Set rs = CurrentDb.OpenRecordSet(strSql)
Then use RS to perform actions. There may be better ways. You can, for example, create a query directly in Access and call it from VBA.
While looping the recordset, you can concatenate the string:
Dim strResult As String
While (Not rs.EOF)
strResult = strResult & rs!yourfield
WEnd