Custom Programming Special Features

Date Handling

Every date field allows you to select the date you want in three ways.  These methods save time and make our applications more user friendly by cutting down on repetitive data entry tasks.

Date Picker

You can click the date picker button

to reveal a familiar pop-up calendar.

You can use the right and left arrows to navigate through the months.  Click on Today to quickly jump to today’s date.  When you see the date you want just click on it and it will be entered into the date field.

Quick Date

If you prefer to use the keyboard, you can use our handy Quick Date feature.  With just a keystroke you can enter Today’s Date by typing the letter ‘t”.  You can increment up or down a day by pressing the “+” or “-“ keys.  There are also ways to increment up and down by a week, a month or a year.

Typing

Of course, you can always just type a date into the box. You can use a variety of date formats, and our programs will automatically reformat the date into the standard format of mm/dd/yyyy.

Up & Down Sorting

One way we help you manage long lists is to make it possible to sort them easily.  You’ve seen sorting like these on web pages and in programs like Microsoft Outlook.  Here you can see the same list sorted two ways, ascending and descending.  Notice the up and down arrows, each time you click the button called “Date”, the column below is re-sorted.  If you click the button again the column is sorted in the opposite way.

This example is taken from one of our many workflow screens, where users work on each item until the list is completed.  The first picture is the default sort, so when you come to the screen the oldest (most out of date) tasks are at the very top.  If you click the date button, it resorts in the opposite direction so that the very latest tasks are now at the top.  By sorting, you can avoid scrolling through a long list to find the item you want.

Navigating with ‘DVD’ Buttons

When you’re looking at a detail record, you’ll often need to quickly move forward a record, or go backward, to jump to the beginning or to the very end of the set of records. In the lower left corner of our most frequently used data entry screens we add navigation buttons that look like this:

These buttons allow you to remain on the same screen while moving through the records you selected on one of our Index or List screens.  Next to the navigation buttons, we display the record you are currently on (“23”) and the total number of records that you can navigate through (“215”).  Many users want to avoid switching screens and this feature keeps you in one place but allows you to quickly move to another record.

Document Linking

Have you ever worked with a system where you track a ton of data, and yet you also maintain separate documents like contracts, photos, or design specifications and wanted an easy way to link to them?  With our Document Linking feature you can quickly see a list of documents that are related to your database records.  Here is an example:

From the Document screen you can open up the document quickly, saving you the time of finding the folder in Windows Explorer.  On the far right is a color block indicator showing if you can Open the document.

Here’s a real-world example of document links in action.

To maintain Document Links we have a screen that looks like this:

First you give the document a description, and then you can pick a category, and set the Path.  If the Path is local to your machine and no one else on your network will have access to it, we give you a warning in Yellow.  If the Document is missing or you do not have permission to the network path, we warn you in Red.  If the path and file are accessible, then we give the Green OK status next to the Path.

Color Blocks

We use color blocks to give you a quick status of your database records.  A combination of color and shape are used to ensure that the information is more accessible to everyone. 

Red is a square block to draw your attention.

Yellow is a diamond and means caution.

Green is a circle, just like the green light on a traffic signal.

Here’s what it looks like on an index screen:

Here’s a picture of the symbols as they are used on a detail screen to help users know which fields are required, or may need attention.

Selecting Records

At the top of List forms we often add Selection criteria that look like this:

Having the ability to filter a long list down to just the records you care about makes finding the record you want to edit much quicker.  Most of the drop down lists above show the selection by default. For some projects we are able to select different defaults such as the User who is logged in; this is great for most users who usually work with a limited set of records.

Notice that the “Create Date” from and “To” selection has the date picker, just like all other date fields.  For process oriented screens, or work-to-zero lists, we can default in dates to help you find just the current items that need attention without overwhelming you by showing all the records.

The Gender selection above is a sample of an option group.  Only one option is available at a time.  By default “All” is selected so that the screen will show all records of all Genders, defined or not.

Once you pick all the selections you want, you click the Select button in the upper right to apply your selections.  If you need to revert to the default selections, press the Reset button and the screen will instantly go back to the default selections.

Finding Records

The J Street Record Finder allows you to hop through a list of records to quickly find the one you are looking for.

For example if you are on a list of People and you want to find John Smith, you could type smith into the Find feature, and the screen will jump to the first records that contains “smith”.  If there is someone with the last name of “Highsmith”, you will find it before “Smith, John”.  There are two modes for Find: Exact and Contains.  The Exact mode will search for a specific value like ’12456’.  This is handy for exact IDs and codes.  The Contains mode will find the value anywhere in any field.

First will start at the top of the list every time, while “Next” will search from the record you are currently one.  If you currently have a record in the middle of the list selected, “Next” will search from that point downward.  At the end of the list, you’ll be notified that there are no more matches found, and you can start back at the top of the list again.

Flexible Reports

Our report selection screens allow you to have an almost endless way of reporting the data you need with each report.  When you launch a report, you will be shown a screen that allows you to select the records you want to see.  After you make your selections and click OK, your report will appear on screen (with an option to send it to a printer).  Your selections will be remembered while the application is open.  Our report selection screens also have a Reset button to help you quickly return all the selection to their original defaults.  This can be useful if you are running a report in several different ways while working with your application during one session.

Our report selections can be very simple or very complex, depending on your needs:

Here is an example where users can select from several drop down lists, specify a date range, and pick some other options.

Some of our customers require much more complex selection criteria such as this example:

In this second example we have a “Show” section at the bottom of the screen.  On a report that has different sections, the Show feature can hide or show them.  The more sections that are shown, the longer and more detailed the report will be.  If you want to get a quick high level status, simply hide all the lower sections.

After you have made your selections, set which sections you want to Show and you run your report, you will see a recap of your selection criteria at the bottom of each report page in plain English.  This allows you to reproduce the report again at a later date, ensuring that you are comparing apples to apples.  Here’s an example:

The combination of hiding and showing sections, along with the Selection criteria makes the reports we design for you very customizable, so you get a lot more reports for your budget.