Alerts from a Date Field

[dcecil]

I need to keep track of software licenses and hardware warrenties, but need to be alerted somehow when the current date reaches within 90 days of the expiration date field. Is this possible? If so, please describe in detail. I'm a fairly experienced user, but only moderately in the script area. I have managed, however to follow instructions to make pretty complicated scripts and calculations work.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Dave

[sbg2]

Define a calculation field, result is text

MyExpireCheck = If(ExpireDate ≥ Get (CurrentDate) - 90; "Y";"")

Have your script perform a search for MyExpireCheck = "Y"

[dcecil]

Thanks, I'll give that a try.

[dcecil]

When I entered the the calculation If(ExpireDate ≥ Get (CurrentDate) - 90; "Y";"") I get a message saying "Either an operator was omitted, this function cannot be found, or "(" was not expected here" and the [color:"red"] ≥ Get [color:"black"] is highlighted. Any ideas? What is the ≥?

Thanks,

[sbg2]

Whoops copy and paste threw some weird values in there:

If(ExpireDate >= Get (CurrentDate) - 90; "Y";"")

use the Greater Than/Equal To operator in place of >=

[dcecil]

I'm still having a problem. I don't think it is recognizing the GET function. I read on the internet that there is a plug-in that will allow the GET command, but this is for version 6. I have version 5 and my company won't let me get the new version (or buy a plug-in). Any ideas?

Thanks,

[dcecil]

I fiddled around with the calculation and replaced the GET with STATUS (because it wasn't recognizing the GET function) and replaced the ; with , and it seemed to work. That is until I went to a record that had an expiration date of 4/26/06 and it put YES in the field. Is there any reason why it is ignoring the year in this case? I'm still fiddling around with it, but if you can think of anything, that would be great!

Thanks,

dcecil

[comment]

Try:

ExpireDate <= Status(CurrentDate) - 90

[dcecil]

I don't know what I was thinking. It still does not work. If I put in >=, it ignores the year, if I put in <=, it doesn't work at all.

[comment]

See the attached.

expiryDate.fp3.zip

[dcecil]

Upon close examination, I noticed that it still does not work. It seemed to work, but as I entered other dates (for next year) or changed my computer date to ones that it should have changed to 1, it did not. I don't know that much about scripts, but this seems to be a simple one, but it looks like it is more difficult that I had imagined. I cannot find any script that does this in any FM books that I have.

[comment]

Can you give an example of an entry in ExpiryDate that produces an incorrect result in cExpiryNear?

[BobWeaver]

Comment, I think you had a sign reversed in your formula. Also, if you don't want the alert to continue after the expiration date has passed, then the formula will need to be like this:

(ExpireDate<= Status(CurrentDate) + 90) and (ExpireDate >= Status(CurrentDate))

[comment]

Argh! So I have. Sorry.

I don't know about the other thing - I would think the alert should be doubled.

[BobWeaver]

I guess it depends how the user deals with the record as it approaches expiration date. Is the date changed, or the record deleted? If so, no problem. If not, then old records would continue to be flagged forever which would be a nuisance.