Lookup How and When?

[Joseph31]

Not sure how to really do a lookup -- I normally just relate two tables and make a relationship field to show the data on the page I need. A problem with this that I see (Please correct me if I am wrong)

1) If the data changes over time your records change too (IE: If I say an Sample Illness is 24 months and I use this in a equation on today) but what happens if in 6 months from today I update the illness from 24 months to 30 months --- it changes all my records to that new illness months)

How do I do a lookup field --- Never done one:

I need to look up a illness (By Description) and return a value in another field

How..

Thank you for your help

[bcooney]

Exactly, lookups are used when the data shouldn't change (Prices in an invoice is probably the most common example).

You wouldn't want to relate by description, by the way, but rather by Illness ID.

In the Invoice example, in a line item record, the user enters a PartID. The Invoice Line Item record has a field "Price" that is a lookup. Its definition is to lookup "Price" from Parts using the relationship InvLineItem::PartID = Parts::PartID.

[Joseph31]

Thanks -- I tried both _- I cannot get it to work -- The field is blank?

How do you get it to look up?

[bcooney]

Tried both? What do you mean?

Lookup is an entry option in Define fields.

[Joseph31]

I did that --- Maybe I do not understand let me recap my setup:

Two Tables:

Insured (Illness & IllnessLE)

Illness (Illness & IllnessLE)

Relationship:

ID_Insured = ID_Illness

On the Insured page I have two fields:

Illness -- This is a drop down menu from the illness page -- So I can pull up the illness without typing

IllnessLE -- This is the lookup -- I want it to look at the Illness field and return the correct value.

What did I do wrong?

Thank you for the help...

Edited October 14, 2010 by Guest