Browse popup on phone entry not working

[Greg Fong]

I am modifying the membership app to function as a birthday club database. One of the key functions is in the record entry of the phone number. I am trying to design it so that if there is a match, the system will pop up a browse containing the names and personal data of records that contain the same phone number.

What I have tried is the following code located in the onchange event of the phone field:

vnumber=alltrim(Phone.value)
existflag=exist(vnumber,"people info","byphone")

if existflag then
ui_msg_box("Phone Number Already Exists","Would You Like to View Existing Records?")

f=Browse.load("phone")

f:tables:people info:filter_expression="between(phone,vnumber,vnumber)"
'I get "no such field", Then I get all fields, I should be getting 12 records with
'the value of 434-4743 if vnumber=434-4743

f:tables:people info.query()
f.show()
f.activate()
end if


I tried hardcoding the value as seen below and I get one new record and nothing else:
f:tables:people info:filter_expression="phone='434-4743'"


The set which this form is based is made up of two tables one of which is
"people info". The browse (called "phone", boy am I imaginative!) is also based on the "people info" table. There is an index called "byphone" which is based on the expression alltrim(phone).

[Tom Cone Jr]

RE: Browse popup on phone entry not working

Greg,

First thing I'd do is try making it easier for Alpha's between() function to find the parameters you pass to it, by defining them more explicitly. The error message suggests that the function isn't recognizing one of the arguments you are passing.

Instead of:

filter_expression="between(phone,vnumber,vnumber)"


I'd try:

filter_expression="between(people info->phone,var->vnumber,var->vnumber)"


I'm curious why you use the between() function in the first place, since the range of search values is one. Why not something like:

filter_expression="People Info->phone = ' " + var->vnumber + " ' "

It makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up to see a table name with a blank space in it. My personal practice is to NEVER do that. Instead of "People Info", I'd name it "People_Info".


-- tom

[Greg Fong]

RE: Browse popup on phone entry not working

First of all the BETWEEN syntax you suggested worked. I thought I had tried everything regarding the between function. I use the between expression because I thought it was supposed to make use of lightning indexing. In fact I use it practically everywhere. Is there a problem with it other than the fact that the syntax can be a real pain?

I tried the suggestion below but I got the message "filter expression not logical"

filter_expression="People Info->phone = ' " + var->vnumber + " ' "


I tried the following and it worked but of course it is somewhat useless:
filter_expression="alltrim(phone) = '434-4743'

Then I tried:

filter_expression="alltrim(phone) = ' " + var->vnumber + " ' "

IT worked! Thanks once again Tom!

[Tom Cone Jr]

RE: Browse popup on phone entry not working

Greg, congratulations!

Please don't tell anyone else, but I write so few filter expressions these days that I find myself experimenting each time, too. This is another aspect of Alpha Five that seems to have gotten easier and more predictable in Version 5.

-- tom

[Greg Fong]

RE: Browse popup on phone entry not working

The use of a space in the name of a table also gives me the creeps. Unfortunately this is a quicky app and I am modifying it from a sample app ( it is the membership app) that came with version 4.5. Someone should tell Alpha about this. Anyway thanks again.