Synching two copies of a database.

[Chris Good]

I have an invoicing database at a showroom that employees enter orders into. There is a customer and invoices and orders tables. I want to take a copy of the database with me on my laptop but I want to modify the records on the laptop. The copy on the laptop would then become the master copy of the database, but I want to be able to import new customer records and new invoice records into the copy of the database on my laptop. The problem is I also want to import changes to records onto my laptop, but I don't necessarily want to overwrite all of my changes.

Can anyone think of a way to accomplish this?

[Oldfogey]

There is no silver bullet. Can your employees enter new Customers, Orders and Invoices? How are the Orders and Invoices linkd to Customers? Serial, Name, other? Serial could be a real headache.

Let's assume linking by name.

It is a fairly simple matter to identify the additions to the office copy. Just import them, letting your copy determine their (now new) serial numbers.

You can identify changed records in the office copy, using a date stamp. You need to work out who gets precedence, if you and they have made a change to the same record. There is an option in Import to update existing records using a key field, such as name. Have a look at Import.

If you use serial to link your records, you will need to work out a method of changing the office serials and updating the office child field's copy of the Customer serial. (Large bottle of Bourbon recommended.)

Once you've updated your copy, you need to copy it back to the office machine.