Using Xbasic to change a field's value

[Robin Sculthorpe]

Hi,

I am trying to use Xbasic to change the value of a date field named ENTRDATE and a character field named ENTRTIME.

The code I am using follows:

tbl=table.current()
tbl.change_begin
tbl.ENTRDATE=date()
tbl.ENTRTIME=time()
tbl.change_end(.T.)

I get an error messages as follows:

tbl.ENTRDATE subelement is of a different type (ditto for the tbl.ENTRTIME)

Can anyone explain how to do this? I am sure that it is simple, but I'm stuck.

Thank you very much,
Robin Sculthorpe

[Stan Mathews]

RE: Using Xbasic to change a field's value

The error message indicates that the field and expression types are different.

I know you say so, but are you sure that ENTRDATE is a date field and ENTRTIME is a character field? Is the ENTRTIME field large enough to hold a character time value (8).

Did you once have the fields set as another type? You may need to update the table dictionary to get Alpha to recognize the changes.

A quick way to check might be to change your code to
tbl.ENTRDATE=DTOC(date()) and
tbl.ENTRTIME=val(time()).

[Robin Sculthorpe]

RE: Using Xbasic to change a field's value

Stan,

Thank you for your response. I am converting an Alpha 4 application to Alpha 5. The ENTRDATE field was a date field in Alpha 4 and when I examined it today in Alpha 5 (by looking at the field rules), it still indicated that it was a date field. I am not at work right now, so I can't double check on the ENTRTIME field, but earlier today I checked and Alpha 5 indicated that it was a character field. Not sure what field type it was in Alpha 4. Wouldn't field types stay the same? At any rate, I will try your suggestions tomorrow. If I need to update the table dictionary, how do I go about doing that? I am just learning Alpha 5, but am a longtime A4 user.

Best regards,
Robin Sculthorpe

[Stan Mathews]

RE: Using Xbasic to change a field's value

Do a "database compact" from the file menu while the control panel is visible. This will update all table dictionaries.

I modified a script in my setup which contained code similar to yours, but which worked. I changed a statement which stored a numeric variable to a numeric field. I made the statement try to store a character value to the numeric field and Alpha returned exactly the error you report.

This leads me to believe that, for some reason, Alpha is not recogniqing your field types as valid to store a date and a character string.

If you find the problem persists after verifying the field types, try creating a new table from scratch with the same field names with the appropriate field types, create the same form and script that you have problems with, and see what happens.

[Stan Mathews]

RE: Using Xbasic to change a field's value

Robin,

Attachment is a small database with one table and one form.
Buttons on form will perform your script and modified to enter a new record, with the same field to date() and field to time() assignments.

I did notice that I had to add a parentform.resynch() to make the change or enter visible as the current record on the form.

Take a look and see if it's any help.

[Robin Sculthorpe]

RE: Using Xbasic to change a field's value

Stan,

Again, thank you for all your help. Compacting the database did not help, nor did converting the expressions with DTOC() and val(). Apparently, there is a subtle difference in Alpha 4 and Alpha 5 regarding the field rules for calculated fields. I had set up the fields to be calculated (as opposed to being user entered) in A5 just like in A4 and, apparently, you cannot modify a calculated field. The error message that was generated was not accurate either. I think I had a similar problem previously, so I changed the fields to default expressions which are entered at the start of data entry and skipped over by the user. Now my code works just fine (that is after I added the parentform.resynch() command that you suggested).

Thank you again so much!
Robin Sculthorpe