Access Cookbook

Create and Use Flexible AutoNumber Fields

Problem

You use AutoNumber fields in your tables to ensure that you have unique values for your key fields, but a key based on an auto-incrementing Long Integer AutoNumber field doesn’t sort your tables in a useful order. Also, auto-incrementing AutoNumber fields always start at 1, and you want your AutoNumber values to start at another number. How can you create a replacement for Access’s AutoNumber fields that gets around these limitations?

Solution

Access makes it easy to add unique value key fields to a table using the AutoNumber data type (referred to as the Counter data type prior to Access 95). AutoNumbers are automatically maintained by Access and ensure a unique value for each record. Auto-incrementing AutoNumber fields always start at 1, with 1 added for each new record. If your only concern is changing the starting number, you can do that by using an append query to insert a record with a specific value in the AutoNumber field. The next record added will automatically be assigned that value plus 1. However, you may have other good reasons for wanting to create a replacement for the built-in AutoNumbers. This solution shows how to create your own flexible AutoNumber fields that are multiuser-ready. You can also combine these custom AutoNumber values with other fields in the table to make your data sort more intuitively.

Open and run the frmFlexAutoNum form from 06-07.MDB. Add a new record. Type in some data, and be sure to put ...