Figure 10.2: Parameter Details

Table 10.1 lists the parameter display types and explains the characteristics of each parameter type.

N O T E : Depending on the size of your screen resolution settings, browser type, and other variables, one display size value may display differently between users. A display size that looks correct to one user may cascade over the edge of a screen for another user. You should test your parameters and adjust your display sizes as necessary before fully distributing them.

For some of the parameter display types, you must set the parameter options. Parameter options let you create labels for radio buttons, check boxes, and menus. They also set the field values for the tables in the database. Further, you can use them to hide selected values or set default selections for values. Figure 10.3 shows an example of the Parameter Options screen.

Figure 10.3: Parameter Options

N O T E : Values for the database must be unique.

The following is an illustration of how and when a user might need to create a parameter.

Lisa owns an independent medical lab and her clients include many hospitals and clinics. Often hospitals send her patient samples and request a standard set of tests. Lisa uses @task to track her work and assign tests to her technicians. She has created several projects and tasks for each set of tests, however, Lisa needs some custom data to attach to her projects. She needs to capture information about which client a request came from and what set of tests was requested.

Lisa begins by creating two parameters, one to track clients and one to track requests. For the parameter to track clients, Lisa creates a new parameter, names it, and describes it. Because she has many clients and each request comes from a single client, she selects a drop-down menu as the display type. Hospital names can be long, so she selects a display size 0f 200, and a data type of text.

In the Parameter options screen, she types the name of every hospital she has as a client, and uses the Move arrows to organize them with her best clients at the top of the menu. Figure 10.4 displays Lisa's parameter options.

Figure 10.4: Lisa's Parameter Options

She also creates a parameter for the set of requested tests. She uses a multi-select drop-down menu for this parameter because some clients request multiple sets of tests, and she fills in the other fields as she did for the first parameter. In the Label fields of the parameter options screen, she types the names of all the test sets that she can do.

Lisa also wants to keep track of whether her clients are up to date on their payments, so she creates two parameters to keep track of their status and how much is owed. She creates radio buttons to show the status, and a text field for a balance amount.

One of the test sets Lisa does is related to impaired drivers. When she receives a request for one of these tests, she creates a project for it. In this project she has a task to test for blood alcohol, and a different task to test for each kind of illegal drug that can impair judgment and ability. However, for her tasks, she needs custom data to record whether test results are positive or negative. She creates a parameter for this using two radio buttons. For this parameter, most of the time results are negative, so she selects negative as the default parameter.

Now that Lisa has created all of her parameters, she wants to group them in her forms using parameter groups.

To create a parameter

1. From the Application Home page, click Setup -> Custom Data -> Parameters -> New Parameter.

2. On the Parameter Details tab, do the following:

Type a name and description.

Select the display type. This determines what type of field will be in your forms.

Select the display size. For text display types, the number represents characters, for others, it represents the number of columns in the form.

Select the data type. You can select text, numbers or dates. If you select dates, @task automatically inserts the date tool for you.

3. If you selected a non-text display type, do the following on the Parameter Options tab:

Type a label and value for each selection option that you want to appear in the form. A new line appears when you put information in the blank line.

Check the Hide box to hide specific selections.

Check the Default box to make the selection automatically selected in the form. Users can change the selection.

Use the Move arrows to reorder your selections.

Use the Sort Labels button to put the labels in alphabetical order.

Check the Del box to remove a label.

To view and delete parameters

1. From the Application Home page, click Setup -> Custom Data -> Parameters -> Search Parameters.

2. Fill in the search fields or click Submit to see all parameters.

3. Click on a parameter name to view its details.

4. To delete a parameter, in the Contextual Menu, click Delete Parameter. If the parameter is being used in forms and has data stored in the database, you can force delete the parameter and delete the database information, or you can move the database information to another parameter of the same type. If you do this, the information is not removed from the database.