solutions wanted keeping track of multiple months in timecard template

[thompm65]

Hello,

I am using the timecard template for FM6. I modified it to work on a monthly basis (changed the field week begin to month begin) and then hit a flaw in my design. I need to keep track of hours worked over a range of months, not just one month or one week as the template has. Do I need to set up separate files for each month, and then set up a relationship with these files and the main file?

Or is there an easier way around this. I get the sense that this would be a lot easier in the newest version of FM but I am stuck with FM 6 for now.

Thanks MT

[Vaughan]

For $100 or so you can join the FileMaker TechNet and get a "free" copy of the latest version of FileMaker Pro.

Don't spend time with FMP 6, it's primitive compared to the latest version.

[thompm65]

I would still like an answer, if there is one, for the original question.

Thanks for the first answer, but I did not see a "free" copy of FM Pro with this membership, plus we do not have $100 currently for a membership.

So until we can update.....

[Fenton]

Yes, you're right. You do not get a versions of FileMaker with the $100 Tech Net membership. (It would be kind of crazy of FileMaker to do that.)

As far as "months" go, what do you mean exactly, "I modified it to work on a monthly basis (changed the field week begin to month begin)." Unless you extended the "Day" fields to 31 instances, the repeating fields to 31 repeats, and the portal to 31 rows, then that file is not going to work as "monthly basis." But if you did, then it should; but then it won't work as "weekly" anymore.

It is not really properly relationally designed (many FileMaker example files are not). But I imagine they did it that way because Overtime is, in its simplest form, calculated on a weekly basis, as are time cards in general; so it is not "wrong" to do so, but it certainly does not lend itself easily to other time periods, or reporting on what was done when.

A truly relational design would just have, as basics: EmployeeID, Date, Time_Start, Time_End, Time_Lunch (or not), and hours per day calculation. All the rest, Weekly view, Monthly view, would really just be ways of viewing and summing the above data; via self-relationships on the week and month [using WeekOfYear() and Month() functions].

[Fenton]

Actually, I was wrong. If you are thinking of "monthly" as being 4 working weeks (which you probably are), then it has little to do with real months; it's just 4 weeks. You could leave the file as is, with the Begin Week (which is actually a Date). But add another layer, which would start at the beginning of the year, go for 4 weeks, then increment.

I came up with this calculation, for a "monthy" 4 week period. It has to start on Monday:

WeekOfYear ( Begin Week ) + 1 -

Case (

Mod ( WeekOfYear ( Begin Week ); 4 ) = 0; 4;

Mod ( WeekOfYear ( Begin Week ); 4 )

)

If you built a self-relationship on that, you could view a 4-week "month" of entries.

[P.S. This was done in 8.5. I ain't gonna do it in 6; hate using it; obsolete. But it would work much the same. -]

Edited July 2, 2007 by Guest