>How are developers handling the problem where a primary key and data record is added to a table. The user decides to start the record over so they delete the record. When they start to add the record again with the same key, they will get a duplicate key message because the key, although deleted, is still in the index, until I pack the file. One idea would be to change the key when I delete the record. Is there a better approach anyone is using.

Does the user need to see the primary key? If not, hide it from them and you won't need to worry if there are gaps in the keys. Generate the keys yourself behind the scenes. It is not good practice to have the user generate the primary keys.

If you are stuck with the situation as described above then you may want to mark the record as deleted and then the next time someone wants to add a new record, reuse one of the deleted records and blank out everything except the primary key.