Summarizing data in one field

[lonesomejubilee]

Hi,

I'm a newbie coming from MS Access so I'm used to writing queries. My question is I don't see how to count the number of occurrences in one field. For example, in one field I have a drop down selection of 16 choices. I want to be able to total how many occurrences of each of the 16 choices happen in one field. (i.e. 5 reds, 4 blues, 10 oranges... all in the field categor "color"). In MS Access I could write a query to do this and it would be easy... in FM I am still getting used to the Find... (which is nice to do certain things)

Thanks... Vandy

[transpower]

Try this:

PatternCount ( color ; "red" ), etc. for each class. Then, for the found set, you would want a Summary Field, Total of PatternCount ( color ; "red" ), etc. Hopefully, your colors are distinct!

[lonesomejubilee]

Can you elaborate a little on this... I'm sort of confused. Are saying make a field called patterncount ? I don't get it.... sorry I'm a newbie

[-Queue-]

The field would be a calculation using the function PatternCount, as Transpower has described.

[lonesomejubilee]

I'm sorry, I've never seen the PatternCount function before. Do I have to make a patterncount summary field for each category in the field? Then summarize it?

[-Queue-]

Each type will have an associated PatternCount calculation field and summary field, defined as the total of the calculation field.

[-Queue-]

Here's a quickly-assembled sample file for doing this using two repeating fields. Go to the Summary layout to see the results. Note that summary fields only act on the found set, so all records must be found before the totals will be accurate for the table.

CountColors.zip