Problems formatting fields as combo box

  • Thread starter Thread starter Guest
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G

Guest

Hello,

I'm using Windows 2000 and Office 2002. I am noticing when working in
ACCESS, if I attempt to format a field in a form/datasheet as a drop down or
combo box, instead of it allowing TEXT, it automatically sets the field back
to NUMBER (and though the drop down information text shows on the screen, if
I try to chose one of the selections, I get an error message indicating the
format is not allowed -- as it is expecting NUMERALS.) Any ideas? Thanks in
advance for the help.

Wes
 
Hi, Wes.

Your question raises an oft-misunderstood feature about forms. Forms do not
have "fields", they have "controls". Only tables have "fields", and fields
have a data type as defined in Table Design view. The difference is
significant because a control does not have a data type; it is simply a
container. A textbox control, for example, could hold text, a number, a
date, etc. However, if the control is Bound to a field in the form's
underlying table or query, whatever value is entered there is stored in that
field.

Combo boxes are somewhat unique in that they can *display* something
different from what is being stored in the underlying table. The columns of
the Combo Box are controlled by the Row Source property. What is shown in
the drop down is controlled by the ColumnWidths property--if a column has a
width of 0", it is not shown in the drop-down list. What is stored is
controlled by the BoundColumn property, and finally, what remains showing
after the user has made a selection is the value in the first non-zero-width
column as defined in ColumnWidths.

In a relational database such as Access, it is often desirable to give users
an intuitive text-based drop-down list, but it is more efficient to store
only the foreign key associated with that value, which is usually a numeric
type.

Check out your combo box' properties. I suspect it is bound to a numeric
field, which means you can't change its format to text, the control inherits
the data type of the bound field.

If this does not completely resolve your issue, please post a generic
description of what you are trying to accomplish.

Hope that helps.
Sprinks
 
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