Search Results for 'script'

[Richard Riffle]

Thanks Sam and Brendan. I took your advice and got a refurbished Mac mini to run Tap Forms on and was able to write a working script within a couple hours of getting it delivered. I doubt I’d ever been able to do so just using the iPod/iPhone. I’ll probably be bothering you with scripting questions once I get further along. Thanks again.

[Brendan]

Hi Scott,

A Script is not required for this.

Tap Forms will generate an average from a set of records for you.

If you’re using the Mac version, switch to the multi-column list view, then click the Sigma button ∑ to show the Calculations row. Then beneath your Selling Price field, click the popup button. Choose Average and you’ll be able to always display the average of the selling prices for the properties.

There’s an equivalent way to do it on the iOS version too. Go to the Field Options screen when editing the field in your form template, then set the Calculation Summary option to Average.

If that’s not what you’re looking for, let me know.

Thanks!

Brendan

[Brendan]

@John, well, you can accomplish the same thing with Saved Searches. Instead of moving records from one form to another where one form is a list of prospects and another is a list of members, each with the same kind of information, just create a field you use as a sort of Contact Type where you have a Pick List defined with the different types (e.g. Prospect, Member, etc.). Then create a Saved Search for each of those types. Now when a Prospect becomes a Member, just switch the Contact Type and you’re done. With a Saved Search for each Contact Type, you can then filter your master list and show only the prospects independently from the members, etc.

And when you select a Saved Search to view only those specific contacts, the export records or email function would work on just the set of records found.

Yes, you could also write a script to copy the records from one form to another if you like.

[Scott MacLennan]

Let’s begin with I know ZERO about scripts but it looks like a script would be the most effective way to do something I want to do. I have a database of sold houses, simple enough. I need to find a way to get the average price of a home from the “selling price” field in my database. Is a script the best bet or ???? Newbie, total Newbie and as I said, I know nothing about scripts.

[Sin Cohen]

Hello,
I am looking at options for an inventory system for my personal business. It has grown past the point of convenient bookkeeping with a spreadsheet. The main issue I face is that I have a bunch of different products with technical specifications I like to list out in the inventory list, and then specific instances of each of these products that have unique serial numbers. It seems pretty easy to add any number of descriptive fields to a product listing, but serial number tracking seems less obvious. To be clear, I am not looking for a hand-out or built-it-for-me template. I am happy to do the hard work of learning the software and building the database I need. But before I head down that long path I want to know if Tapforms can even do what I’m trying to do.

I tested out FileMaker, it has an inventory Quickstart template that does what I want right out of the gate. But I found even basic customization of the template they provide to be very unintuitive, so while filmmaker remains a possibility I am looking for other options first.

So the main function I am looking for is to be able to define “Product A” with all its technical specifications, then define one or more “instances” of “Product A” each with a unique serial number. Each instance of “Product A” would be calculated (simple count function) to provide an inventory overview- without having to re-list each instance of “Product A” as if it were a separate product.

Ideally I would then be able to list given instances (by serial number) as sold, at which point there would be some basic sales record info attached to that instance and that instance would be removed from the inventory count for that product.

So again, not looking for a cut and paste solution, but is this a system I can build with tapforms or is it not the right software for the job?

Thanks,
s

[Sam Moffatt]

I personally wouldn’t want to write a script without a physical keyboard regardless of platform and I don’t think I’d like to do too much hard core editing on the iPhone/iPod form factor. There are two reasons for wanting an actual keyboard: being able to quickly type special keys and screen real estate. There’s a detailed explanation of both at the bottom if you’re interested. Fortunately you can get a cheap Bluetooth keyboard and that will help you solve both of those problems.

That said sooner or later I’d suggest grabbing a desktop to work on so that you can use a web browser easier and more importantly Google! You’re learning, you’re going to want to easily copy and paste stuff from the web and try things. On any iOS device, that’s going to be cumbersome. The new iPadOS stuff might make it better but at the cost of screen real estate again. On a Mac you can Command+Tab between two apps to easily copy and paste code to try. It’s a little easier to reason about importing stuff from the forums with a Mac device in a way that isn’t quite as straight for on iOS due to limitations there.

I mentioned elsewhere (or at least thought I did) that you can go to OWC/macsales.com and pick up a cheaper, older generation, second hand Mac Mini that likely has more than enough power to run Tap Forms, hook it up to a monitor or even TV, get a keyboard and mouse (potentially Bluetooth again) and start working. There is an extra cost but if I wanted to learn, I’d prefer to do it on the desktop rather than on the phone. And if you buy the app on both platforms (you do need to buy for each of iOS and Mac), you can use the P2P sync to keep both the phone and desktops up to date (make sure both are online at the same time!).

Detailed reason why keyboard:

The first one is more due to how programming languages rely on keys that you don’t normally type when you’re writing text: ,, ', ", /, =, ;, |, &, !, {, }, [, ], ( and ). Writing these on a keyboard is an extra shift key for many of them however on iOS you need to go to the first layer of numbers and symbols, then sometimes the second layer and sometimes (like the quotes), need to long tap. On top of that the iOS keyboard by default will want to insert “smart” quotes and that’s going to mess things up in weird and wonderful ways if you don’t remember that long tap the quotes. I’ve been through that nightmare before with calculation fields and warn about it frequently as an iOS hazard. I also have multiple languages enabled, so every so often I tap the change language button which is right next to the symbols/numbers button and then it’s a pain to fix that. A real keyboard avoid most of these hazards and impediments.

The second is a little less obvious early on: you want to see as much code as you can. On my iPhone 7 with the keyboard up I get:

– landscape mode: ~9 lines of text and 64 characters per line
– portrait mode: ~21 lines of text and 33 characters per line

When I take the keyboard offscreen I get:

– landscape mode: ~16 lines of text (7 more lines!)
– portrait mode: ~32 lines of text (11 more lines!)

If you have a dedicated keyboard, you can get these lines back that help immensely in being able to understand. I would go for landscape mode because that gives you more character width even though it’s obviously half the lines of text. What I end up seeing happening is that in portrait mode, the lines wrap more frequently and this cuts down the effective number of lines that you have visible whilst making it harder to read due to the wrapping. For perspective the old DOS terminals used to supported 80 characters per line and 25 lines.

This ended up a little wordy, hopefully the details help.

[Richard Riffle]

OK, I’m interested in writing scripts but have no Javascript experience. Further, I don’t have a Mac, only iPhones/iPods to write and debug the scripts. Is it feasible to learn to write scripts this way? Are there additional tools available for iPhone/iPod which would help? Any other options? Or should I buy a Mac?

I have made a few brief attempts at using some of the included script fragments in Tap Forms and was able to retrieve field codes but couldn’t use those to retrieve the value of a record. The experience suggested to me that I may need a better environment to write and debug the script… among other things.

Thanks in advance!

[Daniel Leu]

I don’t really see the motivation to move records since you can hide them using saved searches. With a script you could even hide linked records where the parent is hidden.

Using a script you should be able to create new records in another form and copy the data over.

Cheers, Daniel

---
See https://lab.danielleu.com/tapformspro/ for scripts and tips&tricks

[john cesta]

Has anyone messed with the movie script to get the characters/cast into tapforms?

I’ve tried some various things but not been able YET to do this.

Thanks

[D J Leason]

@ Brendan

I agree! I wish I was following his JavaScript tutorial!
You hear that @ Daniel Leu?

[D J Leason]

@Brendan

Thank you Brendan! That works! I went back to the tutorial and ran it again and in their ‘Try it yourself’ editor. It runs in an HTML doc type and has the following line to get x:

document.getElementById(“demo”).innerHTML = x;

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<body>

<h2>JavaScript Functions</h2>

<p>This example calls a function which performs a calculation and returns the result:</p>

<p id=”demo”></p>

var x = myFunction(4, 3);
document.getElementById(“demo”).innerHTML = x;

function myFunction(a, b) {
return a * b;
}

</body>
</html>

[Brendan]

Hi DJ,

Daniel is correct in his sample. However, you may be able to just add return x; after your second last } but before the last }. Basically your function is returning x, but you’re not returning the result of x to the Script() function.

[D J Leason]

@John cesta

Because x is the variable where the result 12 will be stored.Also I can change the arguments there. That’s what I got from it anyway. I’m new to JS and I copy and pasted it exactly as it was in the tutorial where it worked fine.

When JavaScript reaches a return statement, the function will stop executing.
If the function was invoked from a statement, JavaScript will “return” to execute the code after the invoking statement.
Functions often compute a return value. The return value is “returned” back to the “caller”:
Example
Calculate the product of two numbers, and return the result:

var x = myFunction(4, 3);   // Function is called, return value will end up in x

function myFunction(a, b) {
  return a * b;             // Function returns the product of a and b
}
The result in x will be:
12

[Daniel Leu]

You have to define your function outside of Script():

function myFunction(a,b){
   return a * b;
}

function Script(){
   var x = myFunction(4, 3);
   return x;
}

Script();

Cheers, Daniel

---
See https://lab.danielleu.com/tapformspro/ for scripts and tips&tricks

[D J Leason]

Trying to learn some Javascript so I can use the script field. I replaced the Hello World code with code from a W3Schools tutorial but it doesn’t work. What am I doing wrong?

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