Fred said he had to address the issue of couple that did not take the other
person’s name – such as Mark Jones and Mary Smith. Do you have that issue,
and if so how are you address it?

If I'm addressing both it would be Mr. and Mrs. Mark Jones (similar to
if it were Mark Jones III and Mary Smith, I'd address them as Mr. and
Mrs. Mark Jones III even though Mary isn't the III) Singly, It'd be Mr.
Mark Jones and Ms. Mary Smith.

Why do you have a Family Last Name on the Family table?

From Fred: There is probably ony one sentence that I'd disagree with,
and that is when Dennis said that listing a seperate family name would
be a duplication of data and thus violation of normalization. The
people's names are, of course an entity. But the family name is also
an entity, which is the name that they wish their family to be called
by. Although last names would often be duplicated, "often" doesn't meet
the standard for being able to derive one from the other.

Hmm... hadn't really thought of that before. I suppose, since if I'm
using I consider the last name of the primary contact to be the "family
name," that it would be duplicate data. But as Fred says, "a family name
is also an entity." For now I'm going to leave the field as it is.
But I will think on it some more. If anyone else has an opinion, either
pro or con, and would like to share their reasoning, I'd love to hear it.


Also, on the data entry form, do you provide a way to search for a family
name (I assuming that is what the Family Last Name is form, but want to make
sure).

Also, can you type in a name and find to which family it is associated?
Do you mean type in "Bob Jones" to find out if he's Tom and Sue Jones'
son or Bill and Jane Jones' son? I haven't built that capability in.
Our membership isn't so large that we don't know the family
relationships. Or, if we don't know there's at most, only a few
"Joneses" to click on and see. I can see that this would be a problem
if the data entry person didn't know the families, especially if the
child had a different last name. The search combobox on my main family
form is restricted to primary contacts to make the list shorter, but it
could be easily adapted to include everyone and then jump to the
associated family record on that form.

Also, I’m read through you description again and did not see where you
describe you data entry screen(s). Would you be so kind doing that? I’m
having trouble visualizing the organization of the data entry form?

There are two main data entry forms.

The first is to enter information about the family, home address and
basic information about the individuals in that family. This is a
"first contact" type of form. In a church setting we'll get basic
information like name and address long before we get detailed
information like birthdate.

It's a main form with two separate subforms.

The main form contains the FamLastName, FamilyNotes (a memo field), and
a combobox that I use to search for a family and jump to their record.
It displays FamLastName, FirstName (of primary contact). Easy to use
- type in a few letters, tap F4 and choose a name, or for mouse users,
just click the drop-down arrow and choose.

Subform 1 is the address information in form view, with navigation
buttons so you can add or go to a second address. Fields are street,
city, zip, homephone, address type (primary, winter, college, etc),
active address.

Subform 2 is for the basic individual's information. It is in datasheet
format and contains FirstName, NickName, LastName, Suffix, Gender,
ContactStatus (Primary, secondary, child), and Membership Status
(Member, Constituent, Newsletter Only)

--------------

The second main form is for detailed Individual information. I haven't
redesigned this one yet - my original form was created in Access 95 long
before tabbed windows were available. But I envision a main form with
The Individual information on it title, first, middle, last, nickname,
maidenname, birthdate, marriagedate, notes, occupation, work place. All
of those details we gather over time.

Subform 1 for address information (handy when you have two people with
the same name and you're trying to figure out which is which quickly).

Subform 2 for phone number info (personal phone numbers like cell or work)

Subform 3 for email info

Tabs for membership information one each for Joining, Termination,
Baptism (it's a church database), and Death. And a tab for
committees/groups. I haven't designed anything with tabs yet so it
promises to be a learning experience!


Kathy R.