James,
It is really quite simple. You first create a new form and tie your main
recordset to it. Then from the toolbox choose the tab control and draw the
box in the form the size you want it - probably the size of the form. The
main thing to understand is that every "page" you create will be tied to the
main recordset. So if you want someother form tied to some other recordset
to show on one of the pages (display when you press a tab) you simply insert
a new page, and create or add a sub form on that page. You will need to make
your master and child links just like any other parent-sub form combination.
If you want the reference number to show on each "page" you simply make a
text box on each page and put that as the control source so your user can
see, no matter what information he/she is looking at, they are still
referencing the same reference number (whooo - lot's of references there).
Anyway, it probably sounds much harder than it is because I did not do a
good job at explaining it. Just try it and you will see how it works. I have
done it on our school database so that the main recordsource is the Students
table and the first two pages have different fields related to that. Oh - I
forgot to mention, if you want to create controls tied to the main
recordsource, you just choose the tool and draw away on the page - just the
same way you would do it on the form itself. On my other tab pages I have
things like, Student finances, Current grades, Archived grades, etc. As you
can see, everything is somehow related to the student so each sub form
simply links the master field StudentID to the child field StudentID. Works
like a charm.
If you have any problems - post away. Probably someone out there with much
better explanation skills can help - but this should at least get you
started.
Have fun!
Tom
