Expressions or Xbasic scripts

[ggreb]

I started a maintenance database. The fields are as follows:
Name Type Length Decimal
Vehicle C 16 0
Mileage N 10 0
Date D 8 0
NextMileageDue N 10 0

The vehicle field has four choices, two cars & two bikes that come from a drop down menu. The cars oil changes are to in 5000 miles steps and the bikes in 3000 miles. If I choose a car and then put the mileage in the Mileage field I then want to the NextMileageDue field to show (mileage + 5000), if I choose one of the bikes I want the same field to show (mileage + 3000). I have tried to do it as an expression in field rules, that didn't work, I then went to Xbasic and could not figure how to do it there. I have all the manuals for Alpha Five, but nowwhere does it show how to do simple things like this. It should be just an If else statement, I went into the editor and started to type it out but nothing came from it, after typeing in the first line I tried a carrage return and it wouldn't go to the next line. If anyone could help just give me a start. Thanks

[Reese Fletcher]

RE: Expressions or Xbasic scripts

Gerald,

If you got to Help and then Contents in the menu bar, look for the IF function. I think you should be able to use nested IF functions to accomplish what you need. The explanation of the IF function does cover the use of nested IF functions. I hope this helps ya man.

Reese

[whanigsberg]

RE: Expressions or Xbasic scripts

Gerald,

I believe you are trying to create a conditional default. This is best done in field rules. Right click on the table, choose field rules, select the data entry tab, default expression and finally conditional default expression.

You will see a form in which you can enter the condition(s) and the default expression for each condition.

Bill

[ggreb]

RE: Expressions or Xbasic scripts

Thanks, I will try that.

[ggreb]

RE: Expressions or Xbasic scripts

Thanks Bill, I will also try that, but I have done that and that didn't work.

[martinwcole]

RE: Expressions or Xbasic scripts

on your form, the object "vehicle"
at the ondepart event
if vehicle.value="Car"
nextmileagedue.value=mileage.value + 5000
elseif vehicle.value="Bike"
nextmileagedue.value=mileage.value + 3000
end if

you could also remove the tab stop from nextmileagedue and/or disable it.

you could also, in field rules, set the default date to today - date(), especially if you enter daily.

there must be at least 4 or 5 other ways to do it, but this will help you get started learning how to manipulate data in forms

[bobsk]

RE: Expressions or Xbasic scripts

Have you tried creating calculated fields next to the fields you made? Your expression would be simple.
mileage + 3000

[whanigsberg]

RE: Expressions or Xbasic scripts

Gerald,

This can be done as either a conditional default expression or conditional calculated field, both or either in field rules. Calculated fields get new values whenever a record is saved or resaved. Defaults exist only at initial data entry, are user-adjustable and do not recalculate.

The enclosed specimen does it both ways. I only had two conditions, car and bike. For more, a nested if expression would have been necessary for the calculated rule. For the default rule you would just need to add lines as necessary.

Bill

[ggreb]

RE: Expressions or Xbasic scripts

This is something I didn't know about conditional defaults. I have downloaded your zip file and will look at it over the weekend. Thanks for the help