Originally posted by KAty
i have looked in excel and heinemann but they are not very good explanations
I don't know how else to say it... Heinemann explains things very well, and if used in conjunction with Excel, and it still doesn't make any sense, that's a cause for concern. (which is why you came here, I know).
Keys - fields used to sort/retrieve information
Each key holds a unique item, which applies to one record.
So you could say that a key is a "field entry"
Types of keys:
* single
* composite
* primary
* secondary
Single key - must contain data that is unique
Composite key - created by joining 2 or more fields together.
You will only need a composite key if you have a field which cannot be guaranteed to be unique, so you combine other fields together (to form a composite key), which is definately unique.
For example "Kat.BOS.2003.IPT"
Primary key - must contain a data item/value, they cant be empty or null.
Secondary key - field containing useful items that can be used in searches
That's really all there is to know about them.
I don't know what else to say, or any other way to simplify it for you.