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Product Question

    Date Entry
    Product Question posted 10/23/09 by Jason
    523 Views, 8 Comments
    Question:
    Date Entry
    Answer:

    One of the things we're having a hard time with is the "date" field type.  I find the "3 field" approach to be cumbersom for data entry.  Is there a better way?  I love the flexibility that dabbledb offers in this regard and would love to see that functionality incorporated.

    Thanks!

    J

    Comments

    • posted 10/23/09 by Matt Strenz

      With our date or date and time fields you will see a calendar to select a data when using the "click to change" option on a view displayed in the table format.  When editing a single record you recieve a link to set the current date but the calendar is not yet available in this area.  What sort of flexibility are you after?

    • posted 10/23/09 by Jason

      Well...we do a lot of data entry, and the dates come in all types of formats.  I'd like to be able to just type in the date in any number of formats and have it translate into the "TrackVia date format" i.e. entering 2005.12.31, 12/31/05, 31 Dec 05, or December 13th 2005 would all be recognized as valid dates.  Right now when we're entering dates you have to translate from the numerical month to the abreviated month and in a certain order.  Also, when typing in the year, it defaults to 1990 or something which is problematic for birthdays.  We have to tab into the year field, type "m" for "more", and then type out the whole year.  I know these issues aren't huge, but they make a big difference when doing data entry.  We actually considered using a text field instead for these reasons.

    • posted 10/26/09 by Matt Strenz

      We've logged this request as a suggested enhancement to our date fields.

    • posted 10/26/09 by Jason

      Thanks

    • posted Mar 25 by Wally

      Is there any news on Jason's request for date format flexibility when entering or correcting dates?  This seems to be a small thing but it's very time consuming to correct a date, especially, as Jason mentioned, for birthdays.  I could live with a single format if I could just start typing instead of manipulating 3 different fields.  Having the ability to use the calendar or the three fields is good sometimes for some users, but sometimes just typing it in (as MDY?) is easier and faster.

    • posted Mar 25 by Wally

      I have found a way to speed things up using the calendar widget.  To fix a year, you can click on the month/year displayed, e.g., "December 2009", and then change the year directly.  But when you click "OK", it has lost the day that was there when you started.  So then you have to reselect the day that was correct when you started (opening a likelihood of creating a "day" error while fixing a date that only needed the year fixed).

    • posted Mar 26 by Matt Strenz

      We added the calendar picker since this discussion was started and with this you can jump to a month or year by clicking on the current month/year being displayed.  We'll bring up this concern of losing the day option when using these quick links in the calendar and see if this can be retained.

    • posted Mar 26 by Chris Basham

      Here's a 1-minute video that covers the calendar widget.

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sp-1WFMKHj4