SQL Table With A Call To Action?

Question

This is all done in Microsoft Access 2007 and SQL Server. We are creating a way for our users to quickly make notes on a customer. These quick-notes will contain tags that will prompt the user for data based on that tag. The tags are to be limited to a few select options for the user to pick from. The tags will be coded as [TAG] in the database.

A couple examples:

Order refund

[[OrderNumber]] - Was refunded 

When the user selects the above example, he/she would be prompted with a list of the currently selected customer's orders and a field to allow the user to input a specific order. When the user chooses the order, the quick note would look like:

[123456] - Was refunded

General Note

Emailed receipt for order [[OrderNumber]] to email address: [emailAddress]

Would look like:

Emailed receipt for order [123456] to email address: Seymour@butts.com

The Problem

The main issue is that each tag invokes a different action.

1. An order number tag calls up a function that will extract the order number from a few columns in an order table.
2. An email address tag will show all the current customer's email addresses or allow the user to put a different email into a field.

Our Purposed Solution

We though about putting the data into a table with the following format:

╔════════╦══════════════╦══════════════════════╦════════════════╗
║ NoteID ║   NoteTag    ║   columnReference    ║ tableReference ║
╠════════╬══════════════╬══════════════════════╬════════════════╣
║      1 ║ emailaddress ║     email address    ║ emailAddTable  ║
╚════════╩══════════════╩══════════════════════╩════════════════╝

Now this table may be a quick way to grab the data, but it will be awkward for function calling, and a lot will still be handled programmatically.

The Questions

What is a clean and simple way to invoke particular calls to action in a program based on the tags in a quick note? A big loop checking for tags in a string and then calling the specific functions?

Answer 1

Use a Factory Method.

Public Function GetObjectByClassName(ByRef className As String) As Object
    Select Case className
        Case "Cat: Set Factory = New Cat
        Case "Dog": Set Factory = New Dog
        Case Else: Err.Raise Description:="Factory does not recognise this className."
    End Select
End Function

Now all you need is a class for each action, and an "execute" method in each class.

Dim executor as object
executor = GetObjectByClassName("Dog")
executor.Execute() 'woof