There are a number of ways you could display the JobName associated with the job number.
1. As you mentioned, you could use a popup form, but this could be annoying
2. You could add another textbox in the forms footer to display it, but if it is long, you would have to modify the layout.
3. Another way to do it, without taking up any screen realestate is to use the syscmd method to dispaly some text in the status bar at the bottom left of the Access window. Something like:
Private Sub txt_JobNumber_BeforeUpdate(Cancel as integer)
Dim varJobName as Variant
strCriteria = "[JobNumber] = " & me.JobNumber
varJobName = Dlookup("[JobName], "tblJobs", strCriteria)
if isnull(varJobName) then
msgbox "Invalide job number"
Cancel = true
end if
syscmd acSysCmdsetstatus, NZ(varJobName, "Invalid job Number")
End Sub
