Table question

[Mark O'Brien]

OK, I'm trying to put the following table in Excel into Access. I'm creating a database that's going to last me and my section until I retire. :wink:

I need help, what's the best way to put this info into a table? Right now, all I can see is it put in fields for every heading, i.e.

ECONOMIZER INLET PH CONTINUOUSLY MONITORED
ECONOMIZER INLET PH ALARMED
ECONOMIZER INLET PH Out of service hours
...etc etc

Is there maybe a clever way that I can do this with more than 1 table?

Thanks

Book1
	A	B	C	D	E	F
1			Continuously Monitored?	Alarmed?	Trended?	Out of service hours
2	SAMPLE LOCATION	ANALYZER
3	ECONOMIZER INLET	PH	Yes/No	Yes/No	Yes/No	Number
4		SPECIFIC CONDUCTIVITY
5	DEAERATOR INLET	DISSOLVED OXYGEN
6	CLEANUP EFFLUENT	CATION CONDUCTIVITY
7		SODIUM
...

 

[Russell Hauf]

I guess that I'm not following how your data works. Above your example, you don't list the second column, and the first column has a blank in it...care to explain a bit more?

 

[Mark O'Brien]

On 2002-12-17 12:30, Russell Hauf wrote:
I guess that I'm not following how your data works. Above your example, you don't list the second column, and the first column has a blank in it...care to explain a bit more?

Surely can. It's a messed up table. I'm probably looking at about 60 different analyser. Realistically the whole identifier for the analyser is given by combining the sample location with the analyser type. (as shown below.)

Now, for each analyser, I don't want to know what the readings are. All I want to know is if the plant has this particular analyser then:

1. Does the analyser continuously monitor?
2. Is it alarmed in the control room?
3. Is it trended it the control room?
4. If it is out of service, how many hours is it out of service for. (Total for the quarter.)

If the plant doesn't have the analyser then everything is going to be set to "no". The whole point of this database is going to be benchmarking our plants ability to control their processes.

Book1
	A	B	C	D	E
1	ANALYZER	Continuously Monitored?	Alarmed?	Trended?	Out of service hours
2	ECONOMIZER INLET PH	Yes/No	Yes/No	Yes/No	Number
3	ECONOMIZER INLET SPECIFIC CONDUCTIVITY	Yes/No	Yes/No	Yes/No	Number
4	DEAERATOR INLET DISSOLVED OXYGEN	Yes/No	Yes/No	Yes/No	Number
5	CLEANUP EFFLUENT CATION CONDUCTIVITY	Yes/No	Yes/No	Yes/No	Number
6	CLEANUP EFFLUENT SODIUM	Yes/No	Yes/No	Yes/No	Number
...

EDIT:: What I'm trying to avoid is having one table with about 240 fields. I can handle 4 tables of 60 fields, if need be, but this seems redundant really. Just a smart way to avoid a 240 field table would be lovely. I'm toying with the idea of using one field and using binary to represent the first three things:
e.g. 111 would be continuouly monitored, alarmed and trended in the control room. This would work out lovely. However, I'm inexperienced with Access and db's in general. If there's any other tricks I can use that'd be great.
_________________<font color = green> Mark O'Brien </font>

Columbus Ohio Celtic Supporters Club
This message was edited by Mark O'Brien on 2002-12-17 16:38

 

[Russell Hauf]

Ok, I think that I understand. But before we go further, I want to make sure (I'm sure that you understand).

So you have several LOCATIONs, and each LOCATION can have up to 60 ANALYZERS?

So where you had the space above, it was still the ECONOMIZER INLET location, but was just a different analyzer?

Sorry Mark, and thanks for bearing with me.

-Russell

 

[Russell Hauf]

Oh, and is there a fixed set of analyzers (like a master set)? Not that each location would have one, but is there a global set that wouldn't change?

 

[Mark O'Brien]

No, there are multiple locations and each analyser at each location is going to have to be treated as a separate data point. i.e. there are 4 analysers at the Economiser inlet, pH, dissolved oxygen and two others. However, at some locations we're just looking at Sodium. At others we're looking at pH and Sodium. So unfortunately there's no easy way out to have a table with the analysers to group them by location. I think that makes it clearer. (in my head anyway)

EDIT:: Just re-read your last post. Technically there is a set list of analysers, maybe 5 or 6, I'll need to count. But there is a sort of randomness to analysers at each location.
This message was edited by Mark O'Brien on 2002-12-18 16:03

 

[Russell Hauf]

Well, I can't think of anything (I even wrote some stuff down) that will give you a big advantage. I think the way you have it, as long as you have Location filled in in each row, will be able to be queried just fine. You could get very fancy/technical and have one table with a locationID and locationName, and one with AnalyzerID and AnalyzerName, and then use the ID's in your main table to save space, but I don't think you really need to do that.

Sorry that this took so long,

Russell

 

[Mark O'Brien]

No problems, posting here let me think about it more. I don't like my binary idea so much because it will make querying a pain in the buttocks. One it's set up I wont care what the tables look like so much, unless I ever have to change the design.

Thanks again.