I have a customer db that has a serial number which is based on the month & yr i.e. Jan 06 = 2601xxx. Right now I have to go in and change the serial number at the start of each month....any ideas on how to automate this would be appreaciated!

Hi & welcome to the forum.

Serial key fields should be simply a straight number, however what you want could be calculated as a second field that the user accesses instead of the real serial.

root number does not reset does it? a true serial should not.

SerialField = autoenter serial

CalcField = GetAsText(SerialField)&GetAsText(Month(Get(CurrentDate)))& GetAsText(Right(Year(Get(CurrentDate)),2)

CalcField result should be text

SerialField should be number

That should get your month and year entered into your field dynamically.

HTH,

Tim

Well, it's best to avoid these types of serial numbers altogether. It's much easier to deal with and less problematic if the relational keys have no real-world significance.

If it's important to know when a customer was added, why not simply use a Creation Date field?

Ender is right.

If you still want to see the date combined with the serial number, simply create a calculation field with the formula: Serial & Creation Date

Thanks for the info, the serial# actually is our job#. The first 2 digits represent the year the order was placed, the next 2 digits represent the month and the last 3 digits represent the number of orders received in that month 1,2,3... up to 999. The serial# has no bearing on which customer placed the order.