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“As far as I know, Excel has NEVER worked the way you describe,”

sorry, I disagree, I used to do this as a common exercise.

Anyway, I’m going to leave this now. No use hashing over something that is obviously not going to change anything.

Yes, you’re right, the example I sent does not have the correct formula for the entire table to fill in correctly. I know how to type in the correct formula to get what I want, but that is far slower than the old way Excel used to work when it would automatically figure out what you wanted to do. I guess they took that feature out (I admit that sometimes I curse MS apps for trying to do something for me that I don’t want to do, so maybe this was a case of people complaining about that feature). So I guess the autofill feature is gone and Excel is less user freindly than it used to be. Thanks for nothing Bill!

OK. I attached the exact example I am working on, but here is an even simpler example: One cell at top with a number in it. The one column to the left and down one row, a column of numbers, say 10 rows worth. Put in a formula in the first intersecting cell. Fill down. Excel used to figure out that you wanted to multiply the top number by each of the column numbers and so Excell AUTOMATICALLY adjusted the relative/absolute references to make that happen. I never had to change the relative/absolute references when doing this and I have done this hundreds of times. Now, I have not used Excel much in the last few years, so I was a bit perplexed when I had to do this very exercise this week and it wouldn’t work. Instead it keeps the relative value all the way through and so multiplies the immediate above cell against the immediate left cell, so becomes exponential. Now, I could use the F4 route, but is it far more trouble than the old automatic way of doing it. So, I want to to do it without the F4 nonsense. Like I said, this used to be a very simple operation.

BTW< cycling the F4 key on the when the entire formula is selected will not bring up the correct relative/absolute reference combintation to fill in the table. Only by cycling on each half of the formula can you make it show correctly. Typing it is faster. But having Excel do it for you is even faster. If excel has really dropped this feature I would consider that a major defect of the application.

I am simply trying to fill a table off a multiplication formula. One row of numbers across the top. one row down the side. Put a simple formula multiplying the top row against the column. Very common use of excel. I used to do this all the time and Excel automatically changed the references to accomodate the change in position of the formula. Now it keeps it all relative and so the values are all off. I don’t want to use the F4 option because is very a very clunky way to do it for multiple columns and rows. The data table is also a clunky way to do it. I’m just asking if there is some setting somewhere that will turn on the old automatic referencing that used to make Excel so easy to use. By the way, ranting against MS is the national sport!

Is Microsoft really so stupid they would make it HARDER than it used to be? Come on, this used to be EASY to do. I used to make tables like this in four easy steps: series fill one row across, series fill one column down. Input formula in top left cell and then fill down, formula fill across. Voila, a nice table. Now I have to go through either a complicated F4 rigamarole, or the complicated data table to do something that used to be EASY. An to boot I have to custom fill EACH COLUMN?!?!?! That is completley nuts!!! Please folks, tell me that I’m missing something here, Even MS in it’s infinite mediocrity, wouldn’t get rid of something THAT easy!!

Thanks! I’ll try his out.

Thanks! I’ll try his out.

John, thanks. I put all the validation in VB in the form module and it works well now.

Thanks Charlotte. It was the name autocorrect. I had turned it on a few days ago because we were going to do some changes and I thought I would try it out. It didn’t seem slow at first, but yesterday it was excruciating. I turned it off and the DB works fast again. Amazing.

The references I am referring to are the ones under the tools menu in the VB window for an access form module. There is a long list of references that I assume are found by Access when opening. Some are already checked off (ie, referenced). But the list is inconsitent between different copies of the same front end – some references are missing and some are already checked on one version but not another. It seems to be a problems with Access finding the right references for it’s needs.

“problem” solved. I was explaining what someone told me they did. Turns out to be a bit different. They copied. pasted and renamed the linked tables on the front end only, so the renamed linked tables point at the original table. No new table was made on the back end. Frankly, I didn’t know you could do that! Anyway, I finally figured that out when I realized the “renamed” table on the front end was fully up-to-date with the original table, and then questioned how that could be so. The person who did it finally explained to me exactly what he did when I sat him down and went through it on the screen. Maybe I assumed too much when he first told me what he did and didn’t get enough details.

I tried that – no luck. I’m beginning to think I have a phantom file on a server somewhere. I searched all my LAN drive for files of the same name and came up empty on that too.

Hmmm, a little confusion here.
The original table is on the back end, as are all the tables.

There are NO local tables on the front end. You see the LINKED tables on the front end.

I renamed the tables on the back end and then linked to them from the front end.

Both the original and renamed tables show (as linked tables) on the frontend, and the paths in the Linked table manager show the same DB path.

But , while the original table still shows when the back end is opened, the renamed table does not.

No, this is all done on the backend. In the linked-table manager I can see both the original table and the renamed table (and both have the same path), and when I refresh the link it says it’s ok. Then I go look on the actual back-end and the renamed table is not there. A big mystery!

Well, I think I found the problem with this. We found the records with the ID filed edited to another number. Apparently someone opend the form and started typing in a number to search for a record, then realized they were in a live record and went to filter by form, but left the text in the ID field. That made the record “disappear.” Obvioulsy I have to fix that so it doesn’t happen again.