Populate portal with template of related records based on variable

[jn08]

Hi, I'm having trouble conceptualising how to do this, but I'm pretty sure it's best accomplished with a script, and I'd appreciate any help you guys could give on how to set it up or any additional information.

I have a product table related to a child tasks table. For each product, there is a list of related tasks. Many of the products come out on essentially identical schedules, which means there is a lot of redundant entering of the same tasks over and over again for each product.

Ideally, I'd like to script a few buttons on the product layout that will add a pre-defined set of task records (each including a description and due date) to the tasks portal based on a variable (in this instance, the release date of the product).

For different kinds of products there are different kinds of schedules, hence the multiple buttons.

Hopefully this makes sense. Would love to get any help I can get.

[comment]

Not sure I follow this entirely - sounds quite similar to:

http://fmforums.com/forum/topic/80848-populate-portal-with-related-records-then-alter-fields-in-portal-without-editing-original-record/page__p__375763#entry375763

[jn08]

Hmm. It's similar, but different - and perhaps not so complicated.

In my example, I have a table for products (in this case books). For each book, there's a schedule of tasks (brief cover designer, book editor etc) which is created using a tasks portal on the product layout.

At the moment, tasks are created from the product layout. There are usually twelve or more standard tasks for each book, all of which have to be entered manually every time. What I'd like is to be able to set up a few task templates, which can be selected from buttons. Once pressed, all twelve tasks would be entered automatically. Ideally they'd also auto-populate dates (based on the product's release date).

[comment]

So what exactly would be the difference/s between the templates?

[jn08]

I've figured it out.

Set Variable $ProductID

Set Variable $PublicationDate

#

Go to Layout Tasks

// Then a series of New Record / Request followed by Set Fields before returning to the old layout

Set Field ProductID $ProductID

Set Field Due Date $PublicationDate - [however many days less than the final date]

// And so on and so forth before

#

Go to Layout [original layout]

It takes a bit of time to set up each template, but once they're set they're easy to duplicate and change slightly if other templates are needed.

This might seem really obvious and straightforward, but I'm a total newbie to this, so it seemed quite complicated until I worked through it.