I'm working with Northgate's Reality 11.0 and I'm attempting to extract
the relative position of data from an attribute using the TCL English
commands. It does not appear from my reading that this is possible.

If I need to know the postion of a value in a multivalue attribute and
keep that numerical value for a later test condition, is this possible
using any of the English verbs.

For instance:

If have an attribute that stores dates and looks like this:

^xx/xx/xx]xx/xx/xx]xx/xx/xx]xx/xx/xx^

and my sselect picks value two in this attribute based on my input date,
it there a way to return a 2 and use it for further processing on
another attribute that has values related to the date attribute?

Thanks

Tom

Try BY-EXP fieldname.

Normally, when selecting fields via WITH fieldname = "something", if ANY of
the multivales match the criteria, the single record item is seleced.

By exploding means it will "explode" multi-values into multiple virtual
records and return a multi-valued key pair: item id ] position where ] is a
"value mark", a chr$(253) and position, IIRC, is in hexidecimal.

Mark Brown


"Tom" <temeehan (AT) nospamverizon (DOT) net> wrote

Try creating a dictionary definition for that attribute. Place

A;NV

in attribute 7 (conversion). Then if you do a BY-EXP that defintion will
tell you which multivalue position was returned.

By doing a REFORMAT using that dict defintion, you may be able to use
that position in a later calculation.


Mark Brown wrote:

SH wrote:
Thanks...perhaps I should further explain.

I have two multivalue attributes (fields). One is a date attribute that
contains a series of dates, the other is a transaction code attribute
that contains a series of transactions. These are D2 values, that have a
one-to-one relationship in regard to value placement. Both attributes
are dependent attributes of D1 attribute named type, which has no
meaning in the search I want to perform.

Using the English TCL, if I search for a specific date in the date
attribute and specify a transaction code that I want to determine
occured on the search date, the transaction code returned may be correct
but in another position in the transaction code attribute. If, for
example, the correct date is in position three of the date attribute, I
need the search for the transaction code to look only in position three
of it's attribute since looking elsewhere in the attribute is meaningless.

This really looks like a coding job.

Thanks for the help.

tom

Tom,

Sounds to me like you have to learn all about exploded sorts and output
limiters. Also controlling and dependent attributes.

This is all in the manuals. The file structure you describe is quite
common.

Of course a few lines of BASIC could do it also.

Study you ACCESS manual.

Tom:

Let's say I have an A/P check. In that check I have two attributes:

INVDATES
INVNOS

When a check is issued a variety of A/P invoices are paid (this is why I
have the two attributes). Now say I want a list of invoice#s for specified
date(s).

I could simply say, at tcl:

SELECT APCHECKS BY-EXP INVDATES = "08/15/05" INVNOS

and would get a select list of those inv#s. Or I could do:

SORT APCHECKS BY-EXP INVDATES = "08/01/05""08/15/05" CKDATE INVDATES INVNOS

to get a list of those invoices paid on either Aug 1st or Aug 15th.

Hope this helps.

Bill

Both attributes
"Tom" <temeehan (AT) nospamverizon (DOT) net> wrote

Bill H wrote:
Thanks Bill.

After re-reading once again the information on controlling and dependent
attributes, I determined that I needed the controlling multivalue
attribute to properly allign the two multivalue dependent attributes for
the conditions I was attempting to test. Works like a charm.

Tom

One of the many things that were "optional" with Pick that probably
shouldn't have been