I would copy all records from different tables, from the estimate to the final billing. This way, any changes in the final bill won't affect the estimate, and you keep all information.

Since the estimate and the final bill will use very similar structures, you can use the same tables - just add a 1-character field to the main table, to indicate whether the record is for an estimate or for a final bill.

For reference, it is also convenient to have a pointer, in the final bill, to the original estimate.

>Greetings:
>
>In VFP6, I have developed an estimating project that allows users to create an estimate of costs for an order normally containing over a page of entries. In the past the order would be then re-entered into another program for final billing. We have now decided to streamline and use the estimating module for the final billing as well. Since the estimating program is availabe throught our network (10 users) I need to determine how to segragate the final billing records and secure them from changes after a bill is finalized. Also a previous estimate maybe used to begin a new order with a few changes.
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>Project Overview: multiple DBF relations ie: customers, jobs, code_file, item_cost, job_estimate_recs
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>Now my question: What would be the best way to protect the records that represent a final billing from inadvertant changes yet also have them available as a template for future orders and for sales reports, etc.
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>I have thought about copying final billing records to a billings module (dupe of the estimate module) requiring export/import of multiple databases.
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>Also considered trying to export the final bill report to a ascii file or excel file. Since future price changes would effect order total, derived by relations in the code to price dbf file, it seems I need to save an image of the final billing.
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>Any thoughts would be appreciated.
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>Thanks