DATA Missing? Wisconsin, Microsoft Access imports and Kathy Nickolaus

[kpete]

Microsoft Access imports and Kathy Nickolaus

..............

On election night, all the people that were to bring in spreadsheets, they were given a spreadsheet template. They were asked not to change that template. When the city of Brookfield results came in on election night, extra columns were put into that spreadsheet, which would have been a problem if I had tried to import that in. I saved them, but when I imported them into the Access database, I thought that they were saved at that time, and didn’t have any real reason to believe they weren’t.

Here is a spreadsheet with a column heading and 29 fictional votes. The columns are vote number, who the ballot was cast for, and an alternate way of recording the vote: a simple “Yes/No” field for Prosser. Note that rows 23, 24 and 25 all have bad data (“oops”) in what should be a Yes/No column:



Let’s take Nickolaus’ second point first: that when she imported the records she had no reason to think it failed. What happens in Microsoft Access when importing data that has some bad data? How does Access respond when there’s a problem? I created a database with a table called “VoteTable” and tried to import the data I just created in Excel:


Here is what it says about the bad data:


So it throws up a big warning that explicitly says not all the data was brought in! It also specifies the number of rows that were affected, asks if the user wants to continue, and defaults to No, as in “No - do not import the data.” Nickolaus should have seen a very similar prompt if there was a problem importing her data. (I suspect Microsoft would also have a word or two to say about the allegation that its database product allows imports to silently fail.)


much more (plus spreadsheets):
http://www.pruningshears.us/pruning-shears/2011/4/8/microsoft-access-imports-and-kathy-nickolaus.html

[blondeatlast]

1. Access can be a pain in the butt--and Ms. Nickolaus doesn't strike me as

a really bright person. I've used Access a lot and it still frustrates me at times.

I still think hers is a lamer-than-hell excuse and of course, demonstrably false.

[boston bean]

2. i really despise the program. clunky is how I would describe it.

[medeak]

3. nonpartisan board of retired judges investigating

here is my thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x854479

[Ellipsis]

4. A couple things

First a little primer

Waukesha - Computer glitches, inoperable equipment and other problems troubled Tuesday's primary balloting in Waukesha County, resulting in one candidate mistakenly being posted as winner of a race only later to be declared the loser. The problems also prevented the county from posting final results of races until the early morning hours of Wednesday, and kept the county from posting results online.


In Waukesha County, problems with touch-screen equipment were among a host of snafus.Christine Lufter, who lost a Republican primary in the 97th Assembly District, said Wednesday that she would not likely challenge the outcome, although she was still trying to sort out what happened."There was obviously a huge problem," she said. "And why it affected the 97th race more than any other is confusing."

Computer monitors at the county clerk's office late Tuesday briefly showed Lufter winning her race, as county officials scrambled to correct flawed returns from the City of Waukesha. Final results later showed Lufter losing to fellow Republican Bill Kramer by a significant margin. County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus said some returns from the City of Waukesha inexplicably had data recorded in the wrong column, which momentarily skewed results.

http://solidaritywisconsin.com/content/2006-waukesha-co...

Hardware list with Pics of Equipment
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=854479&mesg_id=855308