Blinky, I think the essence of your post is what is known as optional prompts. Inevitably, this also leads to a discussion of default prompts. Take a look at this post in another thread for guidance on that topic.
Could you re-build the data provider on the fly using VBA? Yes, but it’s kinda messy.
Dwayne Hoffpauir 
(BOB member since 2002-09-19)