How to set up a child record to automatically select its parent?

Question

Hi everyone! I've just started playing with a connected Quickbooks table. I'm trying to find a way to have the records in the Books table automatically select a parent record in my Jobs table. Each Books record has a Job Number field that should associate it with the proper Job record (each Job record has a unique Job Number), but I can't figure out how to create an automation that tells the Books record to "select the job with the matching 'Job Number' as the related Job for this record". I've tried to have it automatically write the Job Number to the Related Job field, but it just inputs some numbers and doesn't select the correct job.

Any ideas?

Thank you in advance!

- Elena

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Elena Larrabee
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juliogomez · Answer

Hi Elena!&nbsp;In your relationship between the jobs and payments received table, is the reference field the Record ID instead of the actual Job Number? Even if you've set up the field to be a reference field and it shows the job number, the underlying data may be the Record ID. This is the only thing I can think of at this moment that might be the problem.------------------------------Anthony Gomez------------------------------

elenalarrabee1 · Answer

Hi Anthony! It is. Do you know if there's a way to make the reference field the job number instead of the record ID without changing my key field in the parent table? I'm trying to avoid doing that if I can.

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Elena Larrabee
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juliogomez · Answer

According to the user guide, Quick Base only uses the Key field, I have tested trying to make another field unique and required tp see if it would allow that to be used in the relationship however I was unsuccessful.

Here's the link I found: https://help.quickbase.com/user-assistance/setting_the_key_field.html

Sorry I can't be more helpful!

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Anthony Gomez
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elenalarrabee1 · Answer

That's okay, thank you! I'll just have to experiment with changing the key field to Job Number. I've just been hesitant to change it since my jobs table is the main table for the app, I don't want it to mess anything up with other relationships.------------------------------Elena Larrabee------------------------------

nathanielhammer · Answer

As a side note,I like to keep a sandbox of my application to do such things as change key fields without actually affecting integral data.&nbsp; To do so, Go to your apps home page&gt;settings&gt;App Management&gt;copy App&gt;Select Copy App with data&gt; the Press Copy App. You then have a play area to experiment in. I am attempting to do something that is the same as you in nature. I will let you know if mine works and how I did it.Good Luck!------------------------------nathaniel hammersmith------------------------------

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How to set up a child record to automatically select its parent?