Converting Access to Base Primary Key problems

[damienm3]

In Access I never used a primary key. Base forces me to have one. I really do not want it I have no information unique enough for it. Is there a way to have a table without it? All of the ones converted and made new have it and would love to delete that field!

Thank You for any help
Damien

[Lorinda]

If you want to be able to edit your data and/or relate the tables, you must have a primary key in Base.

You state that you don't have "no information unique enough for it." This is often the case, which is why a primary key is usually an ID field that is an auto-incrementing integer. Its sole purpose is to serve as a primary key.

I should warn you that many users of Access trying to convert to Base find the process frustrating. Base is the newest component of OpenOffice.org (and thus NeoOffice), and is not particularly user friendly. Many things that are easily done in Access require macros in Base.

Lorinda

[damienm3]

Thank you for the response. I have already converted all of my tables. My database needs are very simple but I did notice that without it I can not edit. Since I have to have it in Neo how do I set it to auto increment? I tried and failed to set up auto numbering how do I set this so I can tab or arrow past the field?

[Lorinda]

With the table open in Table Design View (where you see the field types), select the primary key field and then down below check Auto Increment and set the statement to Identity.

You may find you are not able to do this. If this is the case, you will need to copy the entire table, and paste it into a blank section in the tables section. The basic process is laid out in this wiki article. It assumes that you copy the data from a spreadsheet, but the process is the same for copy from an existing table. If you don't currently have a primary key field, let the wizard create a primary key field for you. The tutorial assumes that the data already includes a field to be used as a primary key.

Lorinda