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Calculated Fields on Forms

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    #1

    Calculated Fields on Forms

    I want to place a calculated field on a form. I calculated this field at the set level and then (in trying to debug) at the database level. Every time I try to place the field on the form, A5 crashes, telling me I have perfomed an illegal function. (If I calculate the field only at the form level, it works.) What's up, and what can I do? I need to use the calculated figure in several places throughout the database, which is why I want it at the set level.

    Roy
    Tags: None
    #2
    RE: Calculated Fields on Forms

    Without seeing the calculation it's hard to say. Remember you can define a variable for a form, make it global, let the user enter a value for the variable, or a value to be used in your calculation, in a calculated field --- it will then be available anywhere in your application until exiting.

    Could you be more specific as to what you want to do?
    There can be only one.

    Comment

      #3
      RE: Calculated Fields on Forms

      Nothing fancy. I just want to display on my form the last five years worth of contributions, but I want to do so with a calculated field.

      All past contributions are stored in the History.dbf. The history database contains Pledge1991 through Pledge2000 for each donor. I want the form I am trying to design to display the last five years of data, but want it universal enough that when I roll over the campaign next year, I will not have to change each field on the form to update it for a later year.

      For the current years form, I want Pledge1995 through Pledge1999 displayed. I have a global variable called CurYear (current year) which has the string value of 2000 (next year, to rollover the campaigh, I want to change only this variable, to 2001).

      This is the formula I wrote for the calculated fields inside the History.dbf. When I press the evaluate button, the proper values display at the bottom of the expression building screen (so I know the language is correct):

      Plg_PY1 =eval("History->Pledge"+ltrim(str(val(Var->CurYear)-1)))
      . . .
      Plg_PY1 =eval("History->Pledge"+ltrim(str(val(Var->CurYear)-5)))

      So, armed with correctly evaluating calculated fields, it's on to the form. When I try to drag the calculated variable Plg_PY1 onto the form, Alph5 crashes. Every time. At exact same moment. Its seems that I am not able to place a calculated field onto a form, even though the calculated field is made available to me in the drag and drop field listings.

      I hope I was descriptive enough.

      Roy

      Comment

        #4
        RE: Calculated Fields on Forms

        The good news:

        I can verify the program behaviour you have experienced.

        The bad news:

        I don't know why.

        In the application experience I have we use three year tracking on most history. We have fields for

        data current year
        dataly last year
        datapy previous year

        and we have operations to archive the datapy information, move the dataly info to datapy fields, move the current data to the dataly fields, clear the current year fields for use. You might consider a similar approach if we can't find another solution.
        There can be only one.

        Comment

          #5
          RE: Calculated Fields on Forms

          Stan,

          Actually, that's exactly what I have been doing today, with only a slight variation. It's still elegant, but I'd rather not have to have that additional table. But, thankfully, HDD memory is cheap.

          Thanks.

          Comment

            #6
            RE: Calculated Fields on Forms

            PMFJI, but do you get the same behavior if you use separate names for each of the five calculated fields?

            -- tom

            Comment

              #7
              RE: Calculated Fields on Forms

              Instead of the complex
              eval("History->Pledge"+ltrim(str(val(Var->CurYear)-1)))
              through -5, I had also tried
              Plg_PY1 = History->Pledge99
              Plg_PY2 = History->Pledge98
              . . .
              Plg_PY5 = History->Pledge95

              and resigned myself to updating the variable assignments by hand once a year. Even these didn't work (indicating its not the complexity of the formula that is at work against me here).

              There was a mistake in my earlier post (my #2). The third line of my sample code (representing the 5th variable) should have been Plg_PY5, not Plg_PY1 (the latter being the variable name for the 1st variable). I really did assign unique variables for each line. (Tom, that may have been your real question. My apologies to anyone else who may have been working on this question for the error.)

              (Tom--PMFJI?? this is a new one for me)

              Roy Lasris

              Comment

                #8
                RE: Calculated Fields on Forms

                Pardon me for jumping in (PMFJI)
                There can be only one.

                Comment

                  #9
                  RE: Calculated Fields on Forms

                  BINGO. (as in Bingo!)

                  -- tom

                  Comment

                    #10
                    RE: Calculated Fields on Forms

                    Is it possible having the same field defined twice (once in the parent table of the set, and once in the child table of the set) is causing the difficulty? I'd look for ways to simplify this.

                    Also, I'd verify that it's possible to drop *any* newly defined calculated field where you are trying.

                    It may be time for you to zip up a sample pack and show it to us.

                    -- tom

                    Comment

                      #11
                      RE: Calculated Fields on Forms

                      But I'm NOT getting older.

                      Comment

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