Administering Fields

Overview

The characteristics and behavior of all fields in ResourceFirst are defined in the Fields page in Administration > System > Fields. Fields can be defined for the following data view types:

How To

Step 1: To administer Fields, click on Administration > System > Fields:

Step 2: Select a View Type at the top left of the page to display all fields for that type. In this example, the type of Project is selected.

The image below shows Project fields. Clicking on a field in the left pane shows the details of the field in the right pane.

Step 3: In the left pane, notice the four columns:

• Label – This is the text the user sees as field headers/titles. It can be edited to any name desired
• Field – This is the internal database field name and cannot be changed
• Type – See Data Type below
• Active – You can make a field active or inactive in the system. Inactive fields are not exposed in a user session

Important! Don’t forget to click the Save icon on the top right of the left pane to save any changes!

Step 4: Set field attributes in the right pane in the image above:

Label (Visible Field Name)

You can click on any field in the Label column and rename it.

Tool Tip

You can define “tool tip” text that will appear if a user hovers over a field on a form.

Description

You can enter a description for the field, which only appears here. This can be used for keeping track of intended field usage for Admin purposes.

Default Width in Pixels

The default width specifies how wide the column should appear (in pixels) in views by default.

Note regarding Field Size: The actual User Defined Field sizes (number of characters) are set in the database. On request, your PDWare representative can expand a User Defined Field if needed (we don’t do this by default to save database space and data transfer speed).

Data Type

You can set the data type for a field by clicking on a cell in the Data Type column and selecting the type from the dropdown. If you are considering changing the data type for fields other than UDFs, consult with PDWare Support.

Available types are as follows:

• Text – Text format fields are treated as text even when a number is in the field. The field is displayed exactly as entered.
• Text Area – Text area fields enable the entry of long input while content is treated as text even when a number is in the field. The field is displayed exactly as entered. The field will display as a large text area.
• List – List fields are automatlicaly set for mandatory lists, and UDFs with list lookup items. In case the column setting does not match, you can set the type here.
• Multi-Combo – Multi combo fields are list fields that allow selecting multiple values. Note, that this only applies to user defined fields.
• GYR – The field will display as a Green-Yellow-Red color drop-down indicator. If the values do not correspond to G, Y, or R the field will be with no color and empty.
• Number – Number is used for general display of numbers. The three types offered are Number, Currency, and Percentage. Currency and Percentage offer specialized formatting, including thousands separator and decimal places.
• Date – This field will display as a date field, and offers multiple formatting options.
• Check Box – The field will display as a check box. Valid values are true (will display as checked) or false (will display as unchecked). Invalid values will be treated as false.
• Html – The field will display as a large text area with formatting enabled.
• Hyperlink – The field will display as a single hyperlink, that when clicked on will open the destination in another tab.

Please consult with PDWare Support if you have questions about specific field data types.

Filter Type

You can define what type of filter should be used if the user tried to filter a column when in a view.  Available filter types are List (which produces a dropdown list to choose from), Text (which allows the user to do a text search on the field), Number (which limits the user to searching for a number).  If List is used, there should be a corresponding list defined for the column in Administration > Lists. See Administering Lists for details.

UDF# (User Defined Fields)

There are also 200 user defined fields (initially named Field1, Field2, etc.) in the Resource and Project section. There are 30 user defined fields available in the Assignment section. User Defined Fields are indicated by a number in the UDF# column.

If you wish to have the User Defined Field be a list (i.e., with dropdown selection items), then you must also define the field as a List in Administration–>Lists->UDFs, along with its list items. See Administering Lists for details.

Active

Allow in Pivot Reporting

If checked, the field will be available as a selection in the appropriate Pivot reporting options. Which fields go with which pivot reports are defined in an internal system table. As a general rule, project fields will be available in the Project Pivot, resource fields will be available in the Resource Pivot, and Assignment fields will be available in both the Assignment pivot and Project pivot.

Required

You can mark a field as Required via the Required check box. This will make it mandatory in forms and views before data can be saved.

Hide Under and Lock Under Rights

You can specify data rights for the field as to which authority level (or higher) is needed to edit the field (Lock Under Right), and which authority level should have the field hidden (Hide Under Right).

For a table of the various Security Rights and what they mean, see the article Administering Rights and Privileges.

Post Edit and Validation Scripts

A Post Edit Script and/or Validation Script can be inserted for any field. These can be used to cause certain system actions to occur when a value in the field is entered/modified. Please contact PDWare Support for details.