Appending Multi-value lists

Question

I have an Access 2007 data entry form that is bound to a table that is used solely as a holding station for the data until it is reviewed and appended to the permanent tables. There are several fields in the table (and thus form) that have multi-value selections (derived from a look-up table query). The user does not care if the data is searchable so storing in the text field as a long list is fine. The problem is with appending. I cannot append multi-value lists to a table.

I noticed that if I save the table as an excel spreadsheet and then import it back into a table with the same database structure as the exporting table but without multi-value combo boxes for those fields requiring multi-values (they are now just text boxes) that the list is there and formatted the way I want.

So I am thinking, what code is Access using to export the correct values to Excel and could I just use similar coding to append to the permanent tables (which don’t have to have the corresponding text fields formatted as a multi-value list) instead of having to export to an Excel file and then import this back into a new template? Please note that although some of the lists are only 10-15 options, one list has over 50 possible selections to choose from.

I am just trying to make a user friendly data entry interface without scores of vba coding (which I am a newbie at). Alternate ideas are welcome.

Answer 1

Internally, Access is doing just what Allen Browne's ConcatRelated function does. Fortunately, Allen's code will handle multi-valued fields so you can just use it in a query like this

INSERT INTO MainTable ( MealType, Meats )
SELECT MealType, ConcatRelated("Meats","TempTable","TempID=" & [TempID]) AS Expr1
FROM TempTable;

where [MainTable].[Meats] is Text(255) and [TempTable].[Meats] is a multi-valued Lookup field.