Strange behavior while typing in a memo field

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I have a location where users are typing data using a form screen to enter text into a memo field. They are using a front end copy of the database located on their computer which is linked to the backend on their school’s server. While they are typing Access stops accepting the characters they are typing, the status bar suddenly says calculating… and then a progress bar will appear as it would to display the progress of a query. After this happens, much of the text that was typed is deleted. There is no code that should be making this happen and out of more than 80 schools using a copy of this same database, this is the only one reporting this problem. Has anyone ever heard of something like this happening? I connected to one user’s computer and watched as this happened to her. However, I can connect to their server and enter information using a copy of the database’s front end and I do not have this problem.

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Chances are you are hitting some sort of limit in the table the data is going into, or the form the data is being entered on. Several questions and suggestions:

[*]Has the PC being used been rebooted recently?
[*]Do you always get the same behavior at a certain length of text (256?) or does the length seem random?
[*]What verison of Access is being used on the PC?
[*]Have you replaced the front-end on that workstation and if so do you still get the same behavior?
[*]What is the format of the back-end database on the server? (Access MDB, Access ACCDB, SQL Server, mySQL, Oracle, etc.)
[*]Are you doing a sort of some sort on the text field?
[*]Is this an update to an existing record, or adding a new record to a table?

I’ll probably think of some more questions as soon as I post this.

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Answers to questions:

Has the PC being used been rebooted recently?
It is happening on different computers at this location and they are rebooted each morning.

Do you always get the same behavior at a certain length of text (256?) or does the length seem random?
The length of text is random. While I was watching the user type, she typed less than one sentence before it started misbehaving.

What verison of Access is being used on the PC?
Access 2002, SP3

Have you replaced the front-end on that workstation and if so do you still get the same behavior?
Yes, the front-end has been replaced with no success.

What is the format of the back-end database on the server? (Access MDB, Access ACCDB, SQL Server, mySQL, Oracle, etc.)
The backend is Access MDB

Are you doing a sort of some sort on the text field?
No sort is being performed. The user is simply typing text into a memo field on a form screen.

Is this an update to an existing record, or adding a new record to a table?
This is an update to an existing record.

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Answers to questions:
…
Are you doing a sort of some sort on the text field?
No sort is being performed. The user is simply typing text into a memo field on a form screen.

Is this an update to an existing record, or adding a new record to a table?
This is an update to an existing record.

If you are doing an update to a record, then you don’t really know how long the text in the memo field is – and the fact that you get the calculating, followed by the error suggests to me that the data is being sorted in some fashion when it is displayed and before the update ever begins. There is a known issue with memo fields where the data source is being either sorted or filtered in some fashion, and data is truncated at 255 bytes. That may or may not be what is going on here however. As PatriciaW suggests, it could also be a network issue, though I would expect it to be more random in that case. To give you any specific help beyond that would probably require the posting of a sample database.

Actually another possibility occurred to me as I was about to post this. Is it possible that two people were trying to update the same record? There is a refresh interval set for the database (both the back-end and the front-end) that updates displayed data with the latest info in the record, and it is possible that is what the “calculating” message is about. Check the settings for that in both the back-end and the front-end. Those settings are found under Tools/Options on the Advanced tab. Also check to see if you are using record-level locking and the default is set to No locks.

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Both front end and backend are using record-level locking and the default is set to No locks.

I will have the school test the idea that more than one person could be trying to change the same record by making sure only one person is in the database and see if it happens then.

Thanks for taking so much time to give me some ideas of what could cause this type of problem.

Since this is happening at only one school out of 80 schools leads me to believe they must have something else installed at that location that is causing problems.

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My question would be, although it’s not the likely culprit, but does this school system have occasional network issues and slowdowns? (I don’t see how that would delete the data just typed, however.)

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My question would be, although it’s not the likely culprit, but does this school system have occasional network issues and slowdowns? (I don’t see how that would delete the data just typed, however.)

Yes, the network does have occasional network issues and slowdowns. But according to this one location this has been happening for about a year and they just now reported it. I watched the data disappear. It was as if the text had been selected and then deleted immediately after the message “calculating” and the query progress bar on the status bar ended.

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