Field selection dialog boxes let you select multiple items for use in commands, Views and other operations. Analyzer displays a field selection dialog box whenever you need to select or create fields or when copying items from another Analyzer Project. This type of dialog box is most commonly used to add fields to a View.
There are three common features of field selection dialog boxes:
| • | A list of items that you can select from. |
| • | A list of the items you have selected. |
| • | Several buttons for actions that you can perform on the selected items. |
A list View displays a list of items that you can select. The items in the list vary according to the work you are doing. For example, the Selected Fields dialog box may show only those fields that can be acted upon by a certain command.
The Selected Fields dialog and the Fields/Expressions tab of the Edit Table Layout dialog, are enhanced list views.
List Views make it much easier to identify fields for analysis when field names are cryptic and when there are a number of similar fields to choose from. This is particularly common when Analyzer automatically creates table layouts from relational databases or ERP systems, in which encoded or cryptic system field names often have alternate titles that are more user-friendly.
In addition to the field name, list Views have columns that show the alternate field title, data type, field type and other field characteristics. The order of the columns can also be rearranged to suit the needs of the user.
List Views support the following Windows behaviors:
| • | Click column headings to change the order of the columns. |
| • | Click and drag column borders to change column width. |
| • | Click and drag column titles to change order of columns. |
Note: The changes described above apply to all subsequent list Views and are remembered for subsequent sessions.
| • | Click item name to select a single item. |
| • | CTRL+CLICK to select multiple individual items or SHIFT+CLICK to select a block of neighboring items. |
| • | Use the scroll bars to move through the list horizontally and vertically, to see all of the field properties information. |
You can choose the sort order for the data in many selected fields lists. When an arrow appears beside the name of a field, it shows the sort order: ascending or descending. Click the arrow to change the sort order.
Many dialogs in Analyzer allow you to use the speed search capability to quickly identify your desired field(s) in a long field list. If you type characters in the speed search box then the field list will immediately be reduced to show only those fields that contain that text (ignoring case) anywhere in the field’s name or default column title.
For example, “Amount” will show the fields Amount, Budget_amount, Tax_amounts_transferred and Trans (since the column’s title is “Transaction Amount”). All other fields, like Amt or Date will be suppressed from the list.