Friday, January 8, 2010
Database Field Usage
Relevant Tools web forms continuously fill your database with new contacts and you can import contact lists from Excel or other databases. Relevant Tools can also process data notifications from other sources. There can be a lot of data arriving from multiple sources.
Using the 'other operations' function available in Relevant Tools you can examine the field usage in your database and spot any potential issues. First display your database. Then click on the 'other operations' link.
The other operations page gives you three choices. You can display the contents of all records in one report, look at the values of a particular field, or look at field usage in your entire database. Click on 'show field usage' to see how fields are being used in your database.
The report shows the number of records that have a value for each of the user defined fields in your database. But sometimes there may be fields in use in your database that you haven't defined. There is an option to see field usage for all fields existing in your database, even if you haven't defined the field.
This report is particularly useful for finding problems where you may have changed a field name or made a typo and the data is being saved with a field name that you didn't expect. One of the features of Relevant Tools is that all data is saved, even if you haven't defined the field name. So when you see a field that isn't defined and should be, you can simply define it and all the data will automatically be displayed in your regular searches.
There are some fields that are system fields that are used internally, such as Record ID. Some of these system fields may be of interest, such as Created On. You can include system fields in custom views of your database if you want to view or export the system data with your user data.
Using the 'other operations' function available in Relevant Tools you can examine the field usage in your database and spot any potential issues. First display your database. Then click on the 'other operations' link.
The other operations page gives you three choices. You can display the contents of all records in one report, look at the values of a particular field, or look at field usage in your entire database. Click on 'show field usage' to see how fields are being used in your database.
The report shows the number of records that have a value for each of the user defined fields in your database. But sometimes there may be fields in use in your database that you haven't defined. There is an option to see field usage for all fields existing in your database, even if you haven't defined the field.
This report is particularly useful for finding problems where you may have changed a field name or made a typo and the data is being saved with a field name that you didn't expect. One of the features of Relevant Tools is that all data is saved, even if you haven't defined the field name. So when you see a field that isn't defined and should be, you can simply define it and all the data will automatically be displayed in your regular searches.
There are some fields that are system fields that are used internally, such as Record ID. Some of these system fields may be of interest, such as Created On. You can include system fields in custom views of your database if you want to view or export the system data with your user data.
Database Field Usage posted by Jean Christofferson @ 12:04 PM 
