Alpha Software Mobile Development Tools:   Alpha Anywhere    |   Alpha TransForm subscribe to our YouTube Channel  Follow Us on LinkedIn  Follow Us on Twitter  Follow Us on Facebook

Announcement

Collapse

The Alpha Software Forum Participation Guidelines

The Alpha Software Forum is a free forum created for Alpha Software Developer Community to ask for help, exchange ideas, and share solutions. Alpha Software strives to create an environment where all members of the community can feel safe to participate. In order to ensure the Alpha Software Forum is a place where all feel welcome, forum participants are expected to behave as follows:
  • Be professional in your conduct
  • Be kind to others
  • Be constructive when giving feedback
  • Be open to new ideas and suggestions
  • Stay on topic


Be sure all comments and threads you post are respectful. Posts that contain any of the following content will be considered a violation of your agreement as a member of the Alpha Software Forum Community and will be moderated:
  • Spam.
  • Vulgar language.
  • Quotes from private conversations without permission, including pricing and other sales related discussions.
  • Personal attacks, insults, or subtle put-downs.
  • Harassment, bullying, threatening, mocking, shaming, or deriding anyone.
  • Sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, ableist, or otherwise discriminatory jokes and language.
  • Sexually explicit or violent material, links, or language.
  • Pirated, hacked, or copyright-infringing material.
  • Encouraging of others to engage in the above behaviors.


If a thread or post is found to contain any of the content outlined above, a moderator may choose to take one of the following actions:
  • Remove the Post or Thread - the content is removed from the forum.
  • Place the User in Moderation - all posts and new threads must be approved by a moderator before they are posted.
  • Temporarily Ban the User - user is banned from forum for a period of time.
  • Permanently Ban the User - user is permanently banned from the forum.


Moderators may also rename posts and threads if they are too generic or do not property reflect the content.

Moderators may move threads if they have been posted in the incorrect forum.

Threads/Posts questioning specific moderator decisions or actions (such as "why was a user banned?") are not allowed and will be removed.

The owners of Alpha Software Corporation (Forum Owner) reserve the right to remove, edit, move, or close any thread for any reason; or ban any forum member without notice, reason, or explanation.

Community members are encouraged to click the "Report Post" icon in the lower left of a given post if they feel the post is in violation of the rules. This will alert the Moderators to take a look.

Alpha Software Corporation may amend the guidelines from time to time and may also vary the procedures it sets out where appropriate in a particular case. Your agreement to comply with the guidelines will be deemed agreement to any changes to it.



Bonus TIPS for Successful Posting

Try a Search First
It is highly recommended that a Search be done on your topic before posting, as many questions have been answered in prior posts. As with any search engine, the shorter the search term, the more "hits" will be returned, but the more specific the search term is, the greater the relevance of those "hits". Searching for "table" might well return every message on the board while "tablesum" would greatly restrict the number of messages returned.

When you do post
First, make sure you are posting your question in the correct forum. For example, if you post an issue regarding Desktop applications on the Mobile & Browser Applications board , not only will your question not be seen by the appropriate audience, it may also be removed or relocated.

The more detail you provide about your problem or question, the more likely someone is to understand your request and be able to help. A sample database with a minimum of records (and its support files, zipped together) will make it much easier to diagnose issues with your application. Screen shots of error messages are especially helpful.

When explaining how to reproduce your problem, please be as detailed as possible. Describe every step, click-by-click and keypress-by-keypress. Otherwise when others try to duplicate your problem, they may do something slightly different and end up with different results.

A note about attachments
You may only attach one file to each message. Attachment file size is limited to 2MB. If you need to include several files, you may do so by zipping them into a single archive.

If you forgot to attach your files to your post, please do NOT create a new thread. Instead, reply to your original message and attach the file there.

When attaching screen shots, it is best to attach an image file (.BMP, .JPG, .GIF, .PNG, etc.) or a zip file of several images, as opposed to a Word document containing the screen shots. Because Word documents are prone to viruses, many message board users will not open your Word file, therefore limiting their ability to help you.

Similarly, if you are uploading a zipped archive, you should simply create a .ZIP file and not a self-extracting .EXE as many users will not run your EXE file.
See more
See less

New user - field expression help needed

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    New user - field expression help needed

    Hi, I am new to Alpha 5v9, and am trying to convert a database originally done in Excel to Alpha. Its a flat database, for a financial application. There is probably a very easy way of doing this, but I can't figure out best way: Fields: 'Code' = a 2 character alpha e.g. 'su' short for 'sundries, 'lo' sort for 'loans' etc. There are about 30 different 2 letter codes 'Description' is 20 character field e.g. 'Sundries' 'Amount' is a numeric field for the value e.g. �1,000 There are numeric fields for 'Loans', 'Sundries' etc. I use field rules to expand the code 'lo' to Loans, 'su' to 'Sundries etc. which works fine. What I also need to do is to copy the value entered into 'Amount' into the field 'Loans' if the Code = 'Loans' or to the field 'Sundries' if the Code = 'Sundries'

    FIELDS: Code Description Amount Loans Sundries
    lo Loans �1000 �1,000 �0
    su Sundries �250 �0 �250


    Hope that makes sense

    #2
    Re: New user - field expression help needed

    Sounds like you are denormalizing the data. Not necessarily a good idea.

    Create an update operation

    field-------expression----condition
    loans------amount-------code = "Loans"
    sundries--amount--------code = "Sundries"
    etc
    There can be only one.

    Comment


      #3
      Re: New user - field expression help needed

      Thanks Stan - and take your point about denormalising data

      Comment


        #4
        Re: New user - field expression help needed

        Hi Stan - isn't there a way to do it via field rules so that it occurs on data entry rather than as a batch type process?

        Comment


          #5
          Re: New user - field expression help needed

          You post seemed that you wanted to convert existing data. If you want to enter an amount in one field and a code in the other and have the amount copied to the appropriately named field we are looking at something different.

          What do you want to happen if the user changes the code and amount?
          There can be only one.

          Comment


            #6
            Re: New user - field expression help needed

            Sorry I was a bit vague. It's not existing data, it's data input. An amount is input and stored in the Amount field and also copied to a field corresponding to the code input. For example, input of �1000 with code 'Loans' would post �1000 to field Amount, and �1000 to field Loans. Subsequent changes to either the amount or the Code need to be actioned in the same way, ideally at the time of input/change. There are about 20 different codes in total.

            Comment


              #7
              Re: New user - field expression help needed

              Subsequent changes to either the amount or the Code need to be actioned in the same way, ideally at the time of input/change. There are about 20 different codes in total.
              No.

              Subsequent changes need to be removed from the field into which they were originally copied and then copied to the newly entered code field. This means you need to capture the code before it is changed, clear the amount in that field, then copy to the appropriate field.

              This can all be done with field rule event code but it is not a trivial exercise.

              We should probably consider why you deem this process necessary. There may be a way to get the end result from the existing table structure.
              There can be only one.

              Comment


                #8
                Re: New user - field expression help needed

                First of all, thanks for your help. You are absolutely right - the old value needs to be cleared - I am still thinking in terms of an Excel table, in which this is very easy to do.

                The application is a simple accounting database - where bank payments (Field Amount) are being posted and the relevant nominal ledger code is input as a 2 digit alpha (lo =loans, su=sundries, gp=general purchases etc.) As there are over 20 of these codes, when keying in a series of entries, it is quicker for the operator to input just the code and amount, rather than looking for the relevant spreadsheet cell in a row, or box on a form in which to key the amount. I was trying to keep the table structure very simple, and by having the same amount in both the amount field, and the relevant field for the code, it gives a slight double check on the data, and makes reporting by code, filtered by date simpler. Every entry also has a date, and I was planning to to create summary tables by week and by month. I suppose that could all be done within reporting, but I was trying to keep things as simple as possible as this is my first foray into Alpha. The existing data is in this single spreadsheet format in Excel, so transfers easily if I keep this database structure.

                Comment


                  #9
                  Re: New user - field expression help needed

                  Every entry also has a date, and I was planning to to create summary tables by week and by month.
                  This will be easy to do and report with summary operations or report groups and calculated fields. You might also look at crosstab operations for some new analysis options.

                  It is often tempting to try to use previous experience to drive the new endeavor but I'd strongly advise you not try to replicate the Excel application in Alpha.
                  There can be only one.

                  Comment

                  Working...
                  X