Question

I have SQL like this:

SELECT 
Mid(Note, 
  InStr(Note, "device.")-
  (
   InStr(Note, "device.")-
   InStr(Note, "pressure and")
  )
  +13,
  (InStr(Note, "device.") - InStr(Note, "pressure and")) - 14
  )
  AS [Device],
  Count([Device]),
Date_Field & " " & Time_Field AS [DateTime],
EnteredBy
FROM MyLog
WHERE Note LIKE "*removed and*"
GROUP BY [Device]
ORDER BY Date_Field DESC
;

I would like to GROUP BY that custom field [Device] and count how many of each device there are. But the code above gives the error “… not include the specified expression … as part of an aggregate function” for the “… AS [Device]” section.

How can I accomplish this?

Right now the data looks like:

Record1      12/05/12 03:02:12    User2
Record1      12/02/12 01:02:12    User1
Record1      12/01/12 02:02:12    User2
Record2      12/06/12 03:02:12    User2
Record2      12/07/12 03:02:12    User3

But I would like it to look like:

Record1    3
Record2    2

This is the old SQL that works (does not aggregate):

SELECT Mid(Note, 
  InStr(Note, "device.")-
  (
   InStr(Note, "device.")-
   InStr(Note, "pressure and")
  )
  +13,
  (InStr(Note, "device.") - InStr(Note, "pressure and")) - 14
  ) AS Device, Date_Field & " " & Time_Field AS [DateTime], EnteredBy
FROM MyLog
WHERE Note LIKE "*removed and*"
ORDER BY Date_Field DESC;

Answer 1

You cannot refer to the alias device in a GROUP BY in MS Access, but you can create a subquery and refer to the alias from that.

This runs for me:

SELECT EnteredBy, Device, Count(Device) As CountDev FROM (
SELECT 
Mid(Note,InStr(Note,"device.")-
         (InStr(Note,"device.")-
          InStr(Note,"pressure and"))+13,
    (InStr(Note,"device.")-InStr(Note,"pressure and"))-14) AS Device, 
MyLog.EnteredBy
FROM MyLog
WHERE MyLog.[Note] Like "*removed and*")
GROUP BY EnteredBy, Device