Now that we appear to be including DW in the mix, I have a question for y'all.

Suppose I have a database in which I am storing the answers that are given during the various exams that a students might take for a course. The design of the exam is such that it is anticipated that no student will complete the exam (thus, there are NULLs expected for some number of answers to questions for each student for each exam). The scoring on the exam is such that 1 point is added for correct answers, 3 points are subtracted for wrong answers and any _un_answered_ (ie. skipped) questions result in a 1 point subtraction. (Thus, the test is designed to try to suppress pure guesses but to also encourage students to answer all questions before skipping them.)

How do you differentuiate between the NULL of a skipped question (i.e. "No Answer Given") vs the NULL of the question that has not yet been reached (i.e. the "Not Applicable")?

This has occassionally come up in my experience and I have developed sevral diffent qork-arounds. I am just seeking advise here. 😉