New Child Record Linked ID field is not populated with Parent ID

[otto17]

I have searched and cannot find explanation for correcting this situation.
The data base is a Web project based on DBF tables; the linking field, NameId is defined as AutoIncr in the dbf field rules.

The basic structure is that the Name Grid (with Search Grid and Updateable Detail View) can have zero to many address records in a child table.
The child Address table is set as a Linked Grid with the Linked Content defined as NameId(N) to NameId(N).

The link works great and only shows the addresses belonging to the correct name.

The problem occurs when adding a new address record in the linked child table; the NameId field is always initialized as zero.
If I proceed to fill in the other address fields in the new record and save the record, the submit function does not change the NameId field to match the Parent. The new child record is stored with NameId = 0 and therefore not found when viewing the Parent again later.

After reviewing other threads I have tested various scenarios to be sure that the child NameId field is not hidden and can be updated (although I do not want the operator/user to update that field. I need to force the Child table NameId to match the Parent table NameId field.

All the videos I have viewed on linking never show an example linking to 'no records in query' and then adding new record demonstrating how the linking child field is populated/initialized with the parent ID.

Any pointers are willingly accepted, thank you
Otto Gustafson

[Ted Giles]

Re: New Child Record Linked ID field is not populated with Parent ID

Have you got Referential Integrity set to Cascade Changes/Deletes?

[Stan Mathews]

Re: New Child Record Linked ID field is not populated with Parent ID

Probably will get better answers in the Application server area.

[otto17]

Re: New Child Record Linked ID field is not populated with Parent ID

First thanks to Ted and Stan for your consideration.
I reply to myself in case it helps someone's research.

My first problem was that I did not want to set the linked field on the child record to updateable because I did not want the user to fill in the data.
When I did make it updateable I still could not link to the child record because...
of my second bigger mistake that I just didn't think through.

The Parent ID field (NameID) on the Name record was set to auto increment in the field rules to be certain it was unique.
How clever I was (NOT) to also define the NameID field on the child dbf as auto increment.

So even though I was trying to force the content of the field through field mapping (and the grid showed the correct content, but only temporarily), the record would seem to disappear (from where I expected it to be), because, when saved, the dbf engine was overriding my mapped content by incrementing the linking ID field on the child record as required by the field rules I had set in the child table.

When I would look though my dbf table I would find the bad child records with 0/zero as the linking ID that were entered when I had the field set as not updateable, thinking the save was still not working. But in fact the save was working; the linking ID field was being filled with an auto increment ID number and falling to the end of the table (approx qty 15,000).

Now the child table linking ID field is set to 'user entered' in the table field rules (and that effectively won't happen because I won't display the field for updating) and the field is filled by the field mapping function as I hoped it would be.

Lesson: how valuable 2 days away from a problem can be and remember to test with small files so I am forced to see all the records even if I don't look for them.

[Ted Giles]

Re: New Child Record Linked ID field is not populated with Parent ID

Thanks for sharing Otto.