MANY 'or' criteria

[pdberger]

Good afternoon --

I've inherited a very flat db in which we store as many as 20 different
pieces of data for each record. That is, each record has to have a name and
location, and then 20 different parameters. They come in from different
sources, in different sequences. Once we receive them, they don't change.

I'd like to have a query presenting a list of records for which one or more
parameters are missing. I've tried creating two intermediate queries (each
with 10 'or' criteria) and then a third query from those two. I end up with
each record showing up about 50 times.

Is there some easier way, like if the count of the parameters is less than
20, or something like that?

TIA

 

[Jeff Boyce]

The term "parameter" is used in a special was in defining an Access feature.
I'll try to paraphrase...

Your table stores 'attributes' about ... ?hmmm, I'm not sure what this table
is storing data about?!

It sounds like you use one column (field) for each different attribute (I
believe this is what you are calling parameters). The test of this is would
you add another field/column if you added another ... parameter? If so,
there's a chance your data is set up more like a spreadsheet than a
relational database. It's tough to tell, because you haven't provided any
concrete examples or described the domain.

If your data is organized more relationally, in that you have one row for
each valid attribute (?parameter), you could use Access' Totals query to
count how many you have for each ... (I still don't know what we're
measuring ...).

Good luck

Jeff Boyce
Microsoft Access MVP