There's a maximum amount of fields allowed in a table??

[Tasuki]

I was trying something new with PDF files and the Access Database, where a user can fill out a form on a PDF and it automatically gets saved into the Acess Database. It works great with the 10 fields that I tested with.

But when I tried to do it with an actual form there were way too many fields to fit into an Access Table. Is there a way to extend the limit of fields in a table? The data stored will only be a starting point, after the fields have been added to the table, it will be split into separate tables using the query - ing available in Access.

Long story short, is there a way to increase the maximum amount of fields a table can accept?

Thanks,

-T

 

[KornGeek]

How many fields are you trying to store? You might be able to store them as individual records in a table rather than individual fields. This might save you some space.

For instance rather than

FormID Field1 Field2 ... Fieldn

You would have

FormID Field# FieldData


I hope this makes some sense to you.

 

[Tasuki]

That's a good idea also, but I really wish I can have it all in one table first, before having to split up the table into separate tables.

There are about 500 fields... I think?

 

[MichaelRed]

Ms. A. limits 'fields' in a recordset to 255. NOTE this is a RECORDSET limit, not a table limit, so any use of the table (or some of it's fields) may easily exceed the limit without actually having 255 "fields", as joins, indicies, and other 'items' are counted in the 'limit'.


A better (or at least more common) appraoch would be to break down the fields into (more closely) related sub-groups and generate RELATED tables for the grouping(s). 'Modern" db prefers 'deep' over 'wide', so frewer fields and more records is prefered - but KornGreek's suggestion is (in my opinion) somewhat extreme.


MichaelRed
m.red@att.net

Searching for employment in all the wrong places

 

[Tasuki]

Thanks for all your feedback.

Please understand that this was a PDF form given to me that has been used quite often in the past, each PDF filled out was saved somewhere on their harddrive. They want me to have this data all transfered to a database the next time they fill out the PDF.

But you are right, this form needs to be heavily modified by removing like-fields and un-needed fields. I think I will try another way, by having them fill out a form I create in Access which the PDF can use to fill the fields using SQL statements and the form can be printed that way (they really want the format of the form to stay the same).

I'd love to give stars for both of your replies, but I don't know if it qualifies as a helpful topic to anyone besides me.

Again, thanks for your feedback.

-T