importing edited value lists

[kgasman]

I have a problem that I do not understand how to solve.

I created a solution for a therapy practice. One field is for a description of the service for the purpose of billing insurance. I set the validation for the field to value list "psychological services" that uses "custom values". Initially I entered standard values, but allow the user to edit the list.

The problem is that when I update the solution I have to find out if the user edited the "psychological services" value list and enter it into the new blank database I give to the end user.

The solution contains many value lists and this is time consuming.

Any thoughts or suggestions to importing changed value lists?

[Matthew F]

You might consider creating a table specifically for value lists. Users can navigate to a layout that allows them to add new items to each list. Then define your values lists with the option, "use values from field..." rather than "use custom values...". When you update your solution, the users old value lists can be imported along with the rest of their data.

[kgasman]

Thanks for the reply. For clarity let me see if I understand.

I would set the "psychological services" field to use a value list using the option "use values from field...". This value list field would be in a new table with a single field. Each value would be in a single record of that table. I would use the option setting "include all values". I would format the "psychological services" field to a drop down menu so the user could select which value to use. In order to edit the available values I would have to place an "edit" button next to the "psychological services" field so the user could go to a layout in the values table. The layout would need to be a list view. Is this correct?

Would I need a new table for each value list?

thanks again for this help

[Matthew F]

Yes, I think you have the idea.

The layout would need to be a list view.

List view or table view is good.

Would I need a new table for each value list?

No. Just create a new field on the 'Value List' table.

Incidentally, you can use a similar strategy for generating 'user-specific' value lists. For each value list record you would specify not just a value list item, but also a user name. When the users login to the solution a global field would be set with their name or ID. Your relationship between the main layout and the 'value-list' table would then be determined by the user name and you would set the value list to only show the related records.

[kgasman]

thanks...

what a great idea "user-specific" tables. Thank you!

[kgasman]

I have been working on the value list table with multiple fields for each value list I need. I set up a separate layout for each value field as a table view. The layout contains only one field (the one we are interested in editing). I have two buttons on the layout; "enter new value" and "done". I encountered a problem when working on the second value list layout.

Here is the problem. I entered 5 records into the first value list via its unique layout. When I went to edit the second value list via its unique layout it showed 5 empty fields. I could let the user click into any empty field and type in a value, but that is not very elegant. I wanted the user to click the button "enter new value". The button would select the first record with an empty field and insert the cursor there for data entry. I can not figure out how to find the first record that has a empty field. In addition, it would be nice not to have the table show all the empty fields.

any thoughts?

[Matthew F]

This is happening because your value lists are all derived from fields on the same table. Since you are using buttons and scripts to navigate to these layouts you could also add a 'Find' step to the script. Use '*' as the search criteria to hide the 'blank' records.

The alternatives are to show all of the fields on a single layout or define a separate table for each field.

[kgasman]

I used no borders on the field in the layout which made the blank fields not visible.

I used the following script to add a new value to the first empty field found. Not very elegant...any suggestions for improvement

NewValueMS

Set Error Capture [ On ]

Go to Record/Request/Page[ First ]

If [ Get ( LastError ) = 101 ]

New Record/Request

Set Field [ Valuelists::MaritalStatus ]

Exit Script [ ]

End If

If [ IsEmpty ( Valuelists::MaritalStatus ) ]

Go to Field [ Valuelists::MaritalStatus ] [ Select/perform ]

Exit Script [ ]

End If

Go to Record/Request/Page[ Last ]

Set Variable [ $lstrcd; Value:Get ( RecordNumber ) ]

Go to Record/Request/Page[ First ]

Loop

Go to Record/Request/Page[ Next ]

If [ IsEmpty ( Valuelists::MaritalStatus ) ]

Go to Field [ Valuelists::MaritalStatus ] [ Select/perform ]

Exit Script [ ]

End If

Exit Loop If [ Get ( RecordNumber ) = $lstrcd ]

End Loop

Set Error Capture [ Off ]

New Record/Request

Go to Field [ Valuelists::MaritalStatus ] [ Select/perform ]

Exit Script [ ]

[Matthew F]

See this example. It has 2 duplicated fields on the main layout to show a global value list and a user specific value list. Also as you suggested there is a button which changes to a layout for customizing each value list.

example.fp7.zip

[kgasman]

Wow

great example thanks