ADO: ActiveX Data Objects

The Fields Collection Object

Every Recordset object contains a collection of fields represented by the Fields collection object. Within the Fields collection object, there is a collection of Field objects, each representing a column in the recordset. Through the Fields collection object, each individual Field object can be accessed.

Every value within one column of a recordset shares a common group of characteristics, which define that field. These characteristics for each column are stored in a corresponding Field object within the recordset’s Fields collection object.

The Field Object

In its simplest form, a Field object has a name and a value. A field’s name uniquely identifies a column within the recordset. The name of a given field can be accessed through Field object’s Name property, for example:

Dim fld As Field

rst.Open "Authors", _
         "DSN=BiblioDSN"

Set fld = rst.Fields(1)

Debug.Print fld.Name

rst.Close
Set fld = Nothing

The value of a Field object changes depending on which record the record pointer is pointing to. The value of a field can be obtained by the Value property of the Field object:

Debug.Print rst.Fields!Author.Value
Debug.Print rst.Fields!Author

Both of these statements would print the same value, because the two lines are identical in meaning: because the Value property is the default property for the Field object.

When you add new records to a recordset, you can use the Value property to set the value for a particular field in the new record:

rst.AddNew rst.Fields("Author").Value ...