General "Last of" vs "Max of" question

[jclover]

When creating a query in Access (assumption is the data has a unique ID which is numerical...new records, autonumber) how reliable is the "Last of" grouping function vs the "Max of" the ID, and then linking that max of with a record in another query. I've had issues in the past where the "last" record, isn't necessarily the last record entered.

In my case, I'm updating product pricing, so I always want to pull the most recently entered pricing into the query. What drives the "last" of, because it seems much easier to create on query with the last of, than two with a max od and then match.

Let me know if I need to clarfiy...

[Scott Price]

When creating a query in Access (assumption is the data has a unique ID which is numerical...new records, autonumber) how reliable is the "Last of" grouping function vs the "Max of" the ID, and then linking that max of with a record in another query. I've had issues in the past where the "last" record, isn't necessarily the last record entered.

In my case, I'm updating product pricing, so I always want to pull the most recently entered pricing into the query. What drives the "last" of, because it seems much easier to create on query with the last of, than two with a max od and then match.

Let me know if I need to clarfiy...

Max() is preferable since Last() only looks at the last record in the recordset (table, query) This is affected by sort order, so if you are sorting alphabetically and enter a new 'latest' record of Apple, it will not be the 'last' record.

Regards,
Scott

[jclover]

Thank you for your help. I didn't know last takes sorting order into account.

[Scott Price]

Thank you for your help. I didn't know last takes sorting order into account.

You're quite welcome! More information is available in the help files on these two functions. The simplest way is to go into VBA editor window, type the keyword into the Immediate window and press F1.

Regards,
Scott