Checklist

[aria]

Hello,
I'd like to create a form that displays a checklist for a reviewer to check
off as they conduct their document reviews. I have created a table where the
questions are 'entries' and have a unique identiefier as the primary key. I
have another table that has an identifier from a master table (i.e. file
number from a file information table) and the identifier from the questions
table. This table would store the responses to the questions.

Would it be possible to make a form that will display ALL questions for each
file in question? As I have it now, the file information is on the form and
the question information is a subform. But this causes only the questions
with a response to show up instead of ALL of them regardless of whether or
not there is a response.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Tom Ellison]

Dear Aria:

What you describe seems to be typical for a "junction table", which is the
device used to represent a many-to-many relationship.

Here's what is not clear to me. You have numerous reviewers, numerous
documents to be reviewed, and numerous qustions to be answered for each
document. Now, is it the case that only one reviewer will perform the
review on a document, answering all the questions? Or will several
reviewers answer all the questions for a document. Or will one reveiwer
answer some of the questions and another reviewer answer other questions?
The structure of what you should build depends very heavily on these
questions.

It seems you intend to display a matrix of questions by document. Would you
perhaps then be filling in the initials (or other identifyer) of a reviewer
in each "intersection" of document with question?

A very important question is whether this is, or is ever to be a multi-user
database. There are several ways of permitting multiple users to work on
this database without inadvertant conflicts, but something may have to be
designed if this is ever to be permitted.

Please try to answer all the questions I have asked. The steps to follow
depend very much on your answers, and that they be quite accurate, not only
for the present, but for the lifetime of what you are about to build. I
will try not to make it more complex than is made necessary by your
requirements, and it could be fairly simple or quite complex depending on
your needs. Just remember, it is not just your current needs, but all
future needs that must be met.

Tom Ellison

 

[aria]

Tom, thanks for responding!
One reviewer will usually complete the entire review for a document.
Whether one or two persons complete the review is not of importance. We just
need to track that all of the points on the checklist have been addressed for
each document.

Since we have many files, multiple reviewers may be accessing the database
at a given time while conducting reviews on different documents.

I hope I addressed your questions sufficiently. Thanks, again!

 

[Tom Ellison]

Dear Aria:

The picture I get is of a form that shows the document being reviewed first,
then a subform below that containing a list of the checklist.

Now before building this, it is very important to make sure the data design
is complete.

The junction table will contain the intersection of all documents with all
the questions pertaining to that document. That does not mean all the rows
for every possible intersection will be in the table. This is a conceptual
thing. What I expect is that only those intersections that have been
reveiwed will be represented by a row in this table. The form design must
be capable of showing all the questions for the selected document, and be
able to add or delete rows in the junction table as the user directs on the
form.

I strongly recommend you get the table design finished up and post that
here. It may be helpful if I ask questions about it, and I will be able to
visualize what the form would look like and how it would function from that.
Indeed, if I were doing it myself, I'd follow a process much like this. It
can be a back-and-forth process, designing the data, looking at how it would
appear on a form, seeing a deficiency, and changing the table design.

Tom Ellison