Hands-On Microsoft Access: A Practical Guide to Improving Your Access Skills

Multivalue Fields

Suppose you're a company that sells food items, like Northwind. You have a Products table with all the items you sell, with one row for each item: ice cream, yogurt, nondairy creamer, and so on. Among the columns, you include a field to store all the flavors for that item: vanilla, blueberry, Irish crème (see Table 2.14).

Table 2.14. Tables That Include Multivalue Fields

Products
Product	Supplier	Flavors	<<other fields>>
Ice cream	Frozen Delights	Vanilla, Chocolate, Strawberry
Yogurt	Heavenly Cultures	Vanilla, Blueberry, Asparagus, Strawberry
Nondairy Creamer	Foodstuffs Inc.	Vanilla, Asparagus, Hazelnut

Authors
Last Name	First Name	Major Works	<<other fields>>
Dostoevsky	Fyodor	The Brothers Karamazov, Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, The Gambler ...