I ended up working with Professional Services to come up with a solution. In the end, we kept my original solution but with much better conditional logic controls.
The way it works:
The technician selects either Buried drop request, Service Order, or Work Order
If Work Order is chosen then they are presented with a drop-down list to select a particular WO ID.
We built the form so that each WO has its own ADDRESS question that is a drop-down and references a corresponding data source. All other questions have their answers, in that section, pushed from the same data source.
When one WO is selected
Conditional Logic makes its ADDRESS question visible (else not visible). Every WO has an associate ADDRESS question and CL Rule to accompany it.
At the end of the form, I use a
Concantination rule that joins all of the ADDRESS fields together (only one has an answer) into a FINALADDRESS identifier.
On the .pdf Document Template, I use %a [FINALADDRESS] - %a [TOWN] to get the file name that I wanted.
Thank you all for your help.
In the end, it turns out that I was making it more difficult than it had to be.
Todd
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Todd Garthaffner
Network Manager
Waitsfield and Champlain Valley Telecom
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Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2022 11:48
From: Pat Cooney
Subject: Multi-Data Source Form
Hi Todd, you may have seen this already, but @Ian Chamberlain wrote an "Ian's Insights" on pushing data from a data source into repeatable sections, you might want to check it out: https://community.prontoforms.com/groups/community-home/digestviewer/viewthread?MessageKey=2bc7469a-6c1f-4dcc-b3bc-22af246aa0ab
Also, just as a general FYI for you or anyone else who is reading this thread, the official documentation on pushing data from data sources is available here: https://docs.prontoforms.com/1374411/Content/Published/115003313903.html
I'd love to hear what you do on this and please continue to update this thread if you have more questions.
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Pat Cooney
Community Engineer
ProntoForms
community@prontoforms.com
Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2022 11:09
From: Todd Garthaffner
Subject: Multi-Data Source Form
Thank you, Stephen.
Your solution is very similar to my need. In fact, I can make this work without issue if I separate my work orders into separate Forms OR combine my work order customer lists into a single spreadsheet (as you show).
For me, not only are there hundreds of customers per WO, the data is not static. I can have residences that start off as Vacant become active and vice versa. As such, I need to be able to update data sources that are not compiled, that autonomy of data has a value from a simple data refresh perspective.
My goal is to be able to select a work order from a list which then results in a particular data source being made 'active' for the subset of questions.
Maybe my solution lies in the repeatable section? I have never looked into its function. I will today. Thank you
Todd
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Todd Garthaffner
Network Manager
Waitsfield and Champlain Valley Telecom
Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2022 09:49
From: Stephen Morrison
Subject: Multi-Data Source Form
Todd
There are probably a few different solutions to this depending on the scale of your operation, but my suggestion (based on a smaller organisation) is below. Other contributors from larger organisations may have other suggestions.
If I assume that within each work order you have multiple customers, and each customer has potentially more than one address then your data source could look like:
If it is a single address per customer or single customer per work order the data source would be even more straightforward.
Below are some screenshots of how I used my data source to provide options from dropdown lists that pushed data to other questions:
This allows our guys to choose which property they are surveying (from a dropdown list)and populates other data based on their choices.
Does this help in anyway?
Stephen
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Stephen Morrison
Business Information and Performance Director
BCA Insulation
Original Message:
Sent: 03-03-2022 13:15
From: Todd Garthaffner
Subject: Multi-Data Source Form
------------------------------
Todd Garthaffner
Network Manager
Waitsfield and Champlain Valley Telecom
Original Message:
Sent: 03-03-2022 12:09
From: Stephen Morrison
Subject: Multi-Data Source Form
Todd
There are a few "ifs", "buts" and "maybes" to sort through... It depends on the relationship between your work orders, customers and how you allocate the work to your surveyors.
If your Surveyors can pick and choose which work they pick up, then a drop down list of available work orders would be the way to go. If they don't have a choice then maybe consider dispatching the jobs the jobs to them.
If a customer can have multiple Work Orders, you could have a drop down list that selects the customer and then pushes only that customer's work orders to another dropdown list of available work. Choosing from this list could then push data to other questions.
Depending on how you manage your work flow, you could even have your data source as a live Dropbox/Sharepoint document (other providers are available) where new work is added and completed work is excluded (you can use a filter within ProntoForms to only show "available" work for example).
Just my thoughts...
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Stephen Morrison
Business Information and Performance Director
BCA Insulation
Original Message:
Sent: 03-03-2022 11:39
From: Todd Garthaffner
Subject: Multi-Data Source Form
This confuses me a bit.
Are you suggesting that the best approach will be to have a single data source that includes every work order with each of their customer lists compiled in a single spreadsheet?
I began this endeavor with a Work Order list, which was fine. I then used CL to select subsequent customer lists based on which WO was chosen in step 1, as I mentioned that quickly got messy.
If possible I would like to keep the data separate as it is not static, those customer lists do change and it would be easier to replace a single data source as opposed to amending another.
Thanks,
Todd
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Todd Garthaffner
Network Manager
Waitsfield and Champlain Valley Telecom
Original Message:
Sent: 03-03-2022 11:10
From: Stephen Morrison
Subject: Multi-Data Source Form
Hi Todd
If you create and upload a Data Source with all the information you need on it, you can display a drop down list that your Surveyor would select from. You can then push data to other questions based on the selection made.
I have used a CSV file and a Dropbox Excel sheet as data sources and quite straight forward.
If you then choose a Dropdown box to display this list, you will get the Options to push data to other questions.
This approach avoids duplicating questions, pages and reduces the need for Conditional Logic.
Hope this helps
------------------------------
Stephen Morrison
Business Information and Performance Director
BCA Insulation
Original Message:
Sent: 03-03-2022 09:46
From: Todd Garthaffner
Subject: Multi-Data Source Form
I have been working on trying to make a complex form that would allow my surveyors to select a work order from a dropdown list that in turn would allow them to select a customer address and then pre-populate fields based on that selection e.g. Customer Name, Town, Phone Number, Email Address...
The problem I ran into was that the conditional logic was simply too complicated with only two work orders in play, I will have a dozen or so. I then decided to break out the jobs by pages and had each page's questions reference a different data source. This broke my file name convention since each page had duplicate question labels that were being used for the file name of the .pdf. As well, on the .pdf the unanswered questions from the opposing page are included in the form report, which of course is unwanted.
I am at the point of making a form for each Work Order ~ which I do not want to have to do since it makes for a messy Forms Page on the users app.
Any suggestions would be appreciated.
Thank you,
Todd
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Todd Garthaffner
Network Manager
Waitsfield and Champlain Valley Telecom
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