[ACCESS] Requirements for A2 exam, Need to know how...

[Oaktech]

I've had this from our head of ICT, can anyone help him out with this? It's been a flippin' long time since i used access.

 

In the A2 exam students need to be able to do the following;

 

Create a data entry form for each student the form should collect:

• Student’s name

• Address

• Dob

• Passport no

• Parental consent

• Emergency contact details

 

Generate the StudentID & display it on the form. A StudentID consists of the first three letters of their surname and a sequential number one higher than the last number.

 

Now we can do the first part easily how the question on the generation of the studentID is something that we can’t do. I’ve asked 3 other heads of ICT and they don’t know either…struggling!

Edited February 21, 2012 by Oaktech

[ChrisMiles]

I've had this from our head of ICT, can anyone help him out with this? It's been a flippin' long time since i used access.

 

In the A2 exam students need to be able to do the following;

 

Create a data entry form for each student the form should collect:

• Student’s name

• Address

• Dob

• Passport no

• Parental consent

• Emergency contact details

 

Generate the StudentID & display it on the form. A StudentID consists of the first three letters of their surname and a sequential number one higher than the last number.

 

Now we can do the first part easily how the question on the generation of the studentID is something that we can’t do. I’ve asked 3 other heads of ICT and they don’t know either…struggling!

 

Horray for teaching kids the wrong way to do stuff...

 

In order to achieve this you'd have to create a separate auto id field in the table to generate the numerical part of the ID and then on the data entry form create a custom field which appends the characters and the ID together and displays it. Nothing in what you posted says that the StudentID in the described form must be held in the database, just displayed on the form, so the auto id field makes your rows unique and the student ID can be "generated" on the fly on the form.

[Oaktech]

Ok, i've spoken to the ICT chap, and apparently the student ID does need to be stored... Just something else to think on!

[ChrisMiles]

Why does it? Seems like a general lack of understanding in database driven application development to me. So long as all UI components display the student ID in the format requested, why does it matter if its actually held in a database field or not. Surely thats a design choice that should be left to the student. Your list of requirements says absolutely nothing about the underlying data structure, surely the test is to see if the students can decide a way to achieve what is asked (ie the data entry form in the specified format). By restricting them to one solution, and not even a very good solution, you reduce the worth of the test to basically can the student remember which buttons to press. Anyway an ID like that is fundamentally flawed and would never be employed in a real world application.. What happens if the person's name changes? Should their ID change, or not? If not, doesn't that basically remove any usefulness of employing a name as part of the ID?

 

I also think the fact that none of your teachers know how to do it is pretty telling as to the validity of it. Where is the educational benefit? It's just the blind leading the blind.

[Oaktech]

I don't really have the experience to comment on what you have said from a technical perspective, but just reading it in english it seems to me that you are right, there is more than one way to skin a cat, some are more correct than others, and it should be up to the students to design something that works in the most elegant way they can think of. I will pass your words on and we will see what is said.

 

I fear, however, that the concept and specification of the project may have been passed down from on high and then been left to the teacher to implement. The teacher involved is unlikely to set something he doesn't understand how to do!

[ChrisMiles]

I've been developing database drive applications for 15 years and this is how I'd see a student doing it to satisfy the requirements using access, make of it what you will. I cant think of any other way to do it that doesn't involve writing vbs code which I assume you don't teach your students.

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