AutoNumber field question

[Damian]

I have been playing around with adding things into tables and deleting them
BUT now when I enter a new value the auto Number starts from whatever its
been before. It does not reset to 1. Why is that and how do I fix it?

p.s. Gina where are you?

 

[Duane Hookom]

The autonumber shouldn't generally make any difference. I try to hide this
from users. If you really feel you need to reset this, you can try delete
records and then compact your database.

 

[Jeff Boyce]

Damian

I'll echo Duane's comments ...

Access Autonumbers are designed to provide a unique record identifier. They
are generally unfit for human consumption.

That said, why do you care what the value is? (if there's an underlying
business need, let us know, so we can offer relevant suggestions)

Regards

Jeff Boyce
Microsoft Office/Access MVP

 

[Damian]

You guys are right, there is no reason to care.
I was just wondering why its doing that and if it will cause problems.

Thank You.

 

[Jeff Boyce]

It's doing that because Access doesn't want to risk confusing any "child"
records that might be using that (now deleted) Autonumber from the parent
table.

No, no problems, unless, of course, you allow child records to have
'missing' parents...

Regards

Jeff Boyce
Microsoft Office/Access MVP

 

[John W. Vinson]

You guys are right, there is no reason to care.
I was just wondering why its doing that and if it will cause problems.

After you've entered somewhat over four billion records you'll run out of new
autonumber values. If you're entering them at one a second starting today
you'll run out sometime in 2145.