[AccessD] miracle required apparently

[Steve Schapel]

Hi Paul

Thank you.  If you would find a chance to have a closer look at it for 
me sometime on the weekend, that would be brilliant.

In the next day or so, I will put together a simple database to show the 
kind of approach I have taken so far.

Regards
Steve


On 18/10/2023 8:14:18 am, "Paul Hartland via AccessD" 
<accessd at databaseadvisors.com> wrote:

>I don't have much time until the weekend for knocking up a quick test, but
>think that scenario is pretty doable with 4 lots of times, 4 lots of
>classes, upto 8 participants and not being the same time or class zone more
>than once
>
>Paul
>
>On Tue, 17 Oct 2023, 02:22 Steve Schapel, <steve at datamanagementsolutions.biz>
>wrote:
>
>>  Hi all
>>
>>  I'm trying to do something that I initially thought would be reasonably
>>  easy.  But alas, so far success has eluded me.  Any insights accepted
>>  with much gratitude!
>>
>>  The goal:  Assign a number of Participants to a number of Activities
>>  over a number of Sessions.
>>
>>  Very simple example:
>>       4 Sessions
>>       4 Activities
>>       8 Participants (therefore 2 per Activity)
>>
>>  To illustrate:
>>  Let's say the sessions are 9am, 10am, 11am, 12pm.
>>  Let's sat the activities are chess, tai chi, bowls, diving
>>  Let's say the participants are A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H
>>
>>  The stipulation is that each participant should do each activity one
>>  time.
>>
>>  By trial and error brute force, I know that there is at least one
>>  solution, namely:
>>
>>                        chess       tai chi       bowls        diving
>>     9am           A & E        C & F        D & G        B & H
>>  10am           C & G       A & H       B & E         D & F
>>  11am           D & H      B & G        A & F         C & E
>>  12pm           B & F       D & E        C & H        A & G
>>
>>  HOWEVER, I have tried multiple angles of looping through nested (and
>>  sometimes randomised) recordsets based on the core data elements
>>  (sessions, activities, and participants), to write the assignments to
>>  the available slots in a schedule table, and to my shock (and horror) we
>>  always reach the point in the procedure where it gets stuck, due to
>>  trying to assign a participant to two activities in the same session,
>>  but with no valid alternative slot available.
>>
>>  There is no problem if the model calls for the super simple option of
>>  only one participant for each activity.  But otherwise, no dice, so far.
>>
>>  There MUST be a way to make this work?  Surely?
>>
>>  Thanks a lot.
>>
>>  Regards
>>  Steve
>>  --
>>