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Tutorial 9: Using Floating Date Filters on HanDBase Windows Desktop
Product: HanDBase Desktop WindowsArticle Number: 301Creation Date: 12/07/2007
- Topic: Date Filtering

- Product: HanDBase

- Version: 4.0

- Date: November 25, 2007

- Handheld OS: n/a

- Desktop OS: Windows

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Tutorial:

This tutorial's goal is to introduce the enhanced date filtering as a new feature in HanDBase version 4.0. This feature's main function is to allow users greater flexibility in filtering various date tags and ranges. Being able to take advantage of the date filtering extends the previous functionality of HanDBase by allowing users to do such things as filter to show only records with a date matching the current day, tomorrow, yesterday, and "x" amount of days, months and years in the past and present. This could be very useful in the creation of databases which have date sensitive records, such as attendance logs, task and/or project management and datebook replacements.


In this tutorial, the necessary steps to configure date filtering within HanDBase will be detailed. Then, the results of properly configuring date filtering will be examined. Finally, additional resources will be provided should any further information be needed.

Step #1:

The first step towards taking advantage of the ability to use the enhanced date filters, a database first needs to be created. For the purpose of illustration, this tutorial will detail the process of creating a simple task management database. The first step in doing so is to launch HanDBase Desktop. It can be found at the following location:

Start Menu / All Programs / HanDBase 4/

Once running, the create a database with the following properties:

Database Name = “Task Manager”

Field 1 – Name=”Status”, Type=”Check-Box”

Field 2 – Name=”Priority”, Type=”Text”

Field 3 – Name=”Date”, Type=”Date”

Field 4 – Name=”Task”, Type=”Text”

Field 5 – Name=”Notes”, Type=”Note”

Step #2:

a) Once the database is created, the second step is to create views that contain filters based on date criteria.

b) This can be done in the Edit Database Properties window that appears after the initial creation of the database or it can be accessed later via the menu item File / DB Properties.

c) Click on the View button to open the Select a View Window. Initially, there will only be one view, called the Default View. This database will have five (5) unique views. While each view’s description explains what the type of task is that will be displayed in the list, they must first be created and configured.

d) To create a unique view, tap the “New” button at the bottom of the “Select a View” window. A new window with three options will appear. For the purpose of this tutorial, only the Filter option will be configured.

e) To edit the filters for the view, press the “Filter” button.

Step #3:

In order to be able to view the tasks in the database according to date status, there needs views created to show only tasks that are due today, tasks that are due tomorrow, tasks that are already completed, tasks that are past due and finally a view that shows all of the available tasks, both past and present, complete and incomplete.

a) Create views that have titles to match the filter descriptions listed above. In each of the views, create the respective filters listed below:

- Due Today

o Filter 1 = Enabled

§ Field = Status

§ Value = Not Checked

o And/Or = AND

o Filter 2 = Enabled

§ Field = Date

§ Date Range = Today

- Due Tomorrow

o Filter 1 = Enabled

§ Field = Status

§ Value = Not Checked

o And/Or = AND

o Filter 2 = Enabled

§ Field = Date

§ Date Range = Tomorrow

- Past Due

o Filter 1 = Enabled

§ Field = Status

§ Value = Not Checked

o And/Or = AND

o Filter 2 = Enabled

§ Field = Date

§ Date Range = Trailing Year

- Complete

o Filter 1 = Enabled

§ Field = Status

§ Value = Checked

o Filter 2 = Not Enabled

- All

o Filter 1 = Not Enabled

o Filter 2 = Not Enabled

After setting up HanDBase 4 to use the new date filtering functionality as described in the previous steps, it can be observed that when switching views, the different status and date filters are applied, allowing the user to manage the information in a productive manner.

To summarize, this tutorial has introduced enhanced date filtering as one of the many new features in HanDBase 4. Additional resources, if needed, can be found at:

1 YouTube Video version of tutorial

2 link to download database files used in the tutorial


If further assistance is needed, please contact DDH Software's technical support at http://www.ddhsoftware.com/support


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