We have a display program similar to the display in airports. We constantly have request from customers that want it customized or they end up creating their own.

I decided the best way to handle it was create a group of functions in SQL Server to do all of the logic of what to display and how to display it, and have the “client” program just be a display. That way they can tweak the SQL function to customize the display

Ended up being 3 functions for a total of 600 lines of code (a lot of that is variable definitions – have I mentioned how much I hate T-SQL versus pl/SQL?) It provides all the data of the display including the background color of the columns based on logic.

I then spent 15 minutes (that right 15 minutes!!!) creating a proof of concept application in WinDev to show the functionality of the function. This includes all the great built in features of WinDev including:

• First 3 Columns are Fixed
• The last 3 columns are mutliline text that shows the first 3 lines by default
• There are tooltips on those last 3 columns to show the full text
• The height of a row can be adjusted to seen the entire text of that row
• Columns can be hidden and moved around
• Autogenerate a report from the display

Here’s a screen shot

And here is the TOTAL code of the WinDev Screen

 ConSitDisp is Data Source
 Linenumber is int
 SQLStatement is string = [
    select * from ConSitDisp('10/17/12',24,'Both',0,1,1,1,1,1) Order by ActionDate
 ]
IF HExecuteSQLQuery(ConSitDisp,MyConnection1,hQueryWithoutCorrection,SQLStatement) = False THEN
   Info(HErrorInfo())
ELSE
   FOR EACH ConSitDisp
      Linenumber++
      TableAddLine(TABLE_ConSitDisp,ConSitDisp.ActionDate,ConSitDisp.ActionType,ConSitDisp.CustomerName,ConSitDisp.Fuel,ConSitDisp.Oil,ConSitDisp.CustomField1,
                    ConSitDisp.CustomField2,ConSitDisp.CustomField3,ConSitDisp.CustomField4,ConSitDisp.CustomField5,ConSitDisp.CustomField6,ConSitDisp.CustomField7,
                    ConSitDisp.CustomField8,ConSitDisp.CustomField9,ConSitDisp.CustomField10)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,4,ConSitDisp.FuelBackground)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,5,ConSitDisp.OilBackground)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,6,ConSitDisp.CustomField1Background)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,7,ConSitDisp.CustomField2Background)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,8,ConSitDisp.CustomField3Background)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,9,ConSitDisp.CustomField4Background)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,10,ConSitDisp.CustomField5Background)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,11,ConSitDisp.CustomField6Background)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,12,ConSitDisp.CustomField7Background)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,13,ConSitDisp.CustomField8Background)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,14,ConSitDisp.CustomField9Background)
      SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,15,ConSitDisp.CustomField10Background)
      TABLE_ConSitDisp[Linenumber,13]..ToolTip = ConSitDisp.CustomField8
      TABLE_ConSitDisp[Linenumber,14]..ToolTip = ConSitDisp.CustomField9
      TABLE_ConSitDisp[Linenumber,15]..ToolTip = ConSitDisp.CustomField10
    END
 END

PROCEDURE SetBackgroundColor(Linenumber,ColumnNumber,Color)
SWITCH Color
 CASE "Red"
     TABLE_ConSitDisp[Linenumber,ColumnNumber]..BrushColor = iLightRed
 CASE "Lime"
     TABLE_ConSitDisp[Linenumber,ColumnNumber]..BrushColor = iLightGreen
 CASE "Orange"
     TABLE_ConSitDisp[Linenumber,ColumnNumber]..BrushColor = iLightYellow
 END

15 minutes to produce a commercial looking Proof of Concept. You got to love Windev!!!!

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• WINDEV