Chapter 5 Other Functions RW Query and Report Writer The RW Query and Report writer function is a powerful utility to select information upon complex condtions set with 'easy to follow' instructions. It can even be used to access files outside the QUE Accounting series or programs. Description The popup window style access allows you to select files, set relations between files and to select the fields to appear on the output. The output may be directed to either a table format on the screen or a report. Chosing Files When you first enter the program, a listing of files in the current directory are displayed. Highlight the desired file(s) and press F10 to continue to the next phase. Making Relations When more than one file is selected, the first file chosen is considered the parent and a relation must be set between it and its children( subsequent files). To relate files select the field in the parent by highlighting it and pressing enter. Select the corresponding field in the child file. eg. Soc Sec Num relates to Soc Sec Num Press F10 when complete. Select, Sorted by and Where This section tells the computer what data is to be selected and in what sequence. Select the fields from the files and press F10 when complete. Sort the fields in the order in which you would like to see them displayed by selecting them in the sort sequence. eg. Lastname Firstname The Where section uses boolean algebra and range values to create a subset of data. eg. State='PA' .and. Lastname>'MAAA' .or. rate>100.00 Screen or Printer Output The selected information automatically goes to a table display but may be redirected to a printer. Printed reports may include one or more of the following: report headings subtotaling summation averaging maximum and minimun values margins page widths and lengths The math functions are also available while in the screen mode. Saving the Query The selected boolean criteria may be saved for future reference by pressing the F6 key and entering in the brief description. Saved queries may be accessed and executed at any time eliminating the need of having to rekey in the selection criteria. Each time executed the latest data is read from the files. An example of a typical output screen appears below ÉÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍ» ºFilelist º ÈÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍͼ General Ledger MEMFILE Company Setup file GLMAS Chart of Accounts GLTRANS General Ledger Transactions GLBATCH General Ledger Transaction Batch Headers TBDEPT Trial Balance DEPTMAS Department Master SOURCE Source Code table RETRANS Repeating entries SYSFILE Account range file GLHIST General Ledger Transaction History Accounts Receivable ARMEM AR Setup ARHEAD Invoice Headers ARDETL Invoice Line Items PRODUCT Inventory file ARMAS Customer master records ÉÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍ» ºUtility Menuº ÈÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍͼ ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ³09:51:48 Accounts Receivable 02/24/90 ³ ³Company-> ABC Utility Menu Period: 7³ ³ ³ ³F1 Help ESC Exit F6 Calculator F10 Window ³ ³ ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ³ ³ ³QUIT return to MAIN MENU³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³BU. Backup files ³ ³ ³ ³RS. Restore from Backups³ ³ ³ ³IX. Reindex files ³ ³ ³ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ ³ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ Description The utility menu includes miscellaneous functions and those outside the normal realm of operations. They are however very important elements of the system. Backup / Restore / Reindex The first three options on the menu prime responsibility is recovering from hardware and unexpected system malfunctions. The Backup feature copies the system files to backup diskettes. So that in the case of an emergency they may be used to restore the system back to the point in time the copy was made. It is a good idea to perform this operation periodically based on a specific event such as after the close of a period. The Restore function is selected to perform the restoration of files back onto the system. Diskettes must be saved using the backup feature of this system in order to perform a restore. The Reindexing utility is called automatically by the end of period process but may be called more frequently. It recreates your file linkages and cleans up any unused space reserved by deleted records. It is usually the first recourse when experiencing index problems as may be noted by missing or out of sequence data. The simple on screen instructions will guide you through the operations. NOTEPAD (optional) Description The NOTEPAD is a handy, mini word processor that will meet most of your word processing needs. It works most effectively with memo and letters but may be used to access larger documents. Like many word processors it is limited by the size of available memory. Most typical users (640K) will not have a problem. However, it s a good precautionary measure to periodically save your file as you are typing. Operations The NOTEPAD option may be activated from the menu or by pressing the F9 key from within other designated functions.The following keys are active within the NOTEPAD window. Alt-A (A)ppend a file to current file and continue Alt-B (B) place a block marker Alt-F Insert a field from a database Alt-G (G)oto line number Alt-H (H)elp screen Alt-I (I)nsert line Alt-K (K)ill current line Alt-L page (L)ength for printing Alt-M change (M)argins Alt-N edit (N)ew file Alt-P (P)rint file Alt-Q (Q)uit but save edits Alt-R search and (R)eplace Alt-S (S)ave file & continue Alt-T (T)oggle wordwrap on/off Alt-W (W)rite to new file Alt-X e(X)it without saving Alt-Y change director(Y)/wildcard FUNCTIONS: EDIT WINDOW/STATUS LINE: when you enter the notepad, the edit window takes up nearly the full screen. There is a status line at the bottom, which displays the name of the file being edited, the current line and column position of the cursor, the left and right margins, and the status of wordwrap and insert modes (displayed when active as "" and "", respectively.) When a file has been edited, an asterisk will appear at the right side of the top row (next to the "Alt-H=Help" message). CURRENT DIRECTORY/WILDCARD - the notepad gives you the ability to change the working directory and/or filemask at any time. When you first enter the notepad, the current directory will be set to the default DOS directory, and the wildcard will be set to '*.*'. If you would like to change either the directory where the notepad looks for files or the wildcard used (e.g., "*.TXT", "*.PRG"), press Alt-Y and enter the new information. You do not have to enter slashes in front or back of the directory name UNLESS you include a wildcard. For example, to change the current directory to "\ACCT\", you need only enter "ACCT". However, if you want the notepad to look for all the .TXT files in subdirectory \ACCT\, you must enter "\ACCT\*.TXT". If you enter just the wildcard, the current directory will remain unchanged. If you enter a directory name only, the wildcard will be reset to "*.*". If you press Enter without typing in anything, neither the current directory nor the wildcard will be changed. Examples: let's assume that your application is in a subdirectory named \WORKSTUF. The initial current directory/wildcard will be set to "\WORKSTUF\*.*". If you press Alt-Y and enter "*.TXT ", the directory/wildcard will be changed to "\WORKSTUF\*.TXT". If you wish to change to the ACCT subdirectory, press Alt-Y and enter "\ACCT ". The directory/wildcard will then be changed to "\ACCT\*.*". Suppose you then want to look at only the .TXT files starting with the letter P in the directory \ACCT You would press Alt-Y again, and enter "\ACCT\P*.TXT". FILENAMES: when you press Alt-N to edit a new file or Alt-W to write to another file, a scrolling window will appear containing all files that match the current directory and wildcard mask. The directory and wildcard mask will be shown at the top of this window for reference. Note that files with the following extensions will not appear in this directory, based on the assumption that there should be no need to edit binary files: .EXE .COM .DBF .NTX .DBT .NDX .OBJ. To select a file, move the highlight bar to it and press Enter. Also note by pressing a letter key, the first file starting with that value is highlighted. PgUp, PgDn, Home and End keys are also available. INSERT and WORDWRAP: the start-up values for these modes is on. They may toggled off and on at any time by pressing Insert and Alt-W, respectively. The status of these modes appears at the right side of the status line. Additionally, the cursor size will change from large (insert) to small (overwrite) based on the current mode. MARGINS: the start-up margins are 1 and 80. However, you may change these margins at any time by pressing Alt-M and entering the desired values. When you change the margins, the on-screen display will adjust to reflect the new margins. You may use larger values for the right margin than would appear on the 80-column screen. In such instances, you should toggle wordwrap off and scroll to the right to display text beyond the on-screen right margin. The current values of the margins appear on the status line. PAGE LENGTH: the start-up page length for printing is 60 lines. You can change this at any time by pressing Alt-L. SEARCH AND REPLACE: you can search and replace for all or for only a specific number of occurrences of a character string. When you press Alt-R, you will be prompted first to enter the search string, then the replacement string. You will then be asked if you want to replace all occurrences of the search string. If you answer 'N', you will be prompted to enter the number of occurrences to replace. Please note that the search begins at the top of the file and continues either to the end of the file or until the specified number of occurrences have been replaced. PRINTING: you may print the current file at any time by pressing Alt-P. Printing may be aborted at any time by pressing Esc. The format of the printed page is determined by the current settings of the margins and page length. BLOCK COPY used to highlight a block of text to be copied moved or deleted. Alt-B both starts and stops the block marking. A third Alt-B brings up the function window. FIELD INSERTION used to bring in fields from a database. The selected fields will be printed in the body of the letter. CALCULATOR:(optional) Description This is a useful calculator that includes all the basic operators: addition (+), subtraction (-), multiplication (*), and division (/). But it also has some other goodies, including exponentation (^), a percentage(%), a paste function and a full-featured memory. Plus, whenever you press an operator ('+', '-', '*', '/', or '^'), the previous number is shown above the display window. This is handy for when you are processing a list of numbers and forget where you were. Also the calculator can be moved around the screen using the directional arrow keys. The maximum value that can be stored in the calculator is 99,999,999,999.9999. Operations Active Keys: '+' -- addition '-' -- subtraction '*' -- multiplication '/' -- division '^' -- exponentation 'C' -- clear '%' -- Percentage current number 'E' -- clear entry (does not clear previously entered number in pending operation) 'P' -- print (adding machine mode) 'M' -- Memory operations '=' or Enter -- process operation Esc -- exit Calculator 'D' -- change the number of decimal options 'R' -- round the numbers to a specified number pf places Calculator movement keys: UpArrow -- move calculator up one row DnArrow -- move calculator down one row LtArrow -- move calculator left one column RtArrow -- move calculator right one column Ctrl-LtArrow -- move calculator to far left (rows unchanged) Ctrl-RtArrow -- move calculator to far right (rows unchanged) Home -- move calculator to top left corner End -- move calculator to bottom right corner PgUp -- move calculator to top row (columns unchanged) PgDn -- move calculator to bottom row (columns unchanged) Memory Functions: To access memory functions, press "M", then one of the flashing function keys. The function keys are: 'R' -- recall number stored in memory 'C' -- clear memory (reset to zero) '+' -- add current number to number stored in memory '-' -- subtract current number from number stored in memory '*' -- multiply number stored in memory by current number '/' -- divide number stored in memory by current number PASTE function The paste function enables you to paste the current calculator value into a numeric field while adding or changing records in a file. However, erratic results may occur if the number of decimal places in the number to be pasted is larger than the number of decimals of the field described in your file. For example, suppose that you have just used the calculator to derive the result 75.2877. You wish to paste this number into an amount field on the screen prior to popping up the calculator. If the field is only 2 decimal places than the probability is strong that this number will be stored on-screen as 75.29 (although internally it will remain 75.2877). PRINT - Adding machine mode By pushing "P" for Print, the calculator emulates an adding machine.This will be noted by a small "P" to the right of the number window. Each calculation will be sent to the printer (if it is on-line). After all, if you have invested several thousand dollars in PC hardware (and software), why bother spending more money on a ten-key adding machine? Press "P" again to leave adding machine mode.