Hello All,
Do you have a "best practice" for handling zip codes that don't auto-populate or have incomplete information? Does your database administrator add these to a SQL table, do you expect staff to add it, do you track and update the database periodically? For example, we prefer that 06119 state West Hartford (instead of W Hartford), and these zip codes return no data - 03843, 02841, 03821. Auto-populate is such a good feature, speeding up data entry and reducing errors, so we are thinking about how to approach this.
Thank you for sharing thoughts. Best, Sue
susan.carey@wadsworthatheneum.org
Unknown said: [...] do you track and update the database periodically? [...]
[...] do you track and update the database periodically? [...]
Several years ago, after staff began trying to enter new, local Zips that didn't auto-populate, we discovered that the standard TR_CITYSTATE table had apparently not been updated since 2001. Since then, we've subscribed to very affordable monthly updates from
http://www.zip-codes.com/
...with which I completely re-populate TR_CITYSTATE.
I notice they offer an API now, so something completely automated could possibly be set up. My process is still mostly manual, but it takes so little time that I haven't bothered with optimizing it so far.
Thanks, Chris. We can't access TR_CITYSTATE, so the table hasn't been updated. If we make it a project, it sounds like we won't lose the data when an upgrade is installed. Thanks again!