Copy calculated fields in reports

Hi Ingo,

What you're after is covered via the Freehand SQL calc fields.

There are no plans on supporting such a feature on the simple formula builder option, as it does not support freehand text, so copying/pasting will not be supported.

Is there something I'm missing here?

Thanks,

David

Hi David,

I explained it in the other topic I raised yesterday...Freehand SQL is not really an option for the business users, as they only see the logical names of the columns and have no direct access to the DB at times.

Like I said, being able to "just" freehand edit the formula in the "simple" formula builder would make the problem go away, too.

But since that is not possible it would be great to copy a calculated field and then edit the part that needs changing. (e.g. one column in a complicated case statement.

I guess it is the same reasoning as why the copy option that 7.3 offers for charts now was implemented. It just makes live a lot easier and adds to the usability of Yellowfin.

Best regards,

Ingo

Sorry for the delay on this Ingo.

I understand what you're after, but at this point in time, no such feature is planned. Going to have to close this down, but we can re-open if we get more votes on this ;)

Any updates on this one?

Hi David,

Has this request been reviewed or put in a roadmap yet? I think it would be very valuable to freehand in the simple formula builder.

Regards,
Zac

Hi Zac,

I hope all is well,

Thank you for showing your interest in this. Because of this I have gone ahead and made our wider team aware that this is something you are interested in. No updates as of yet, but going forward I will update you as and when I can.

I hope this is ok and have a good rest of week.

Regards,

Mark

Hi All,

I hope all is well,

I want to inform you that we have implemented said Enhancement in our latest release of 9.12 (released today); Added an option to create copies of calculated fields in a report.

You can download 9.12 here. Release notes will be made available soon.

Regards,

Mark

Hi Mark,

Thank you for that update. While this is certainly useful, it is a little restrictive as it doesn't allow the reuse of the calculated fields across reports. I'm not sure whether that is what the original poster was asking or not, but it would seem more useful.

Again, would not be a trouble if we were able to effectively paste or freehand into the simple editor.

Kind Regards,
Zac

Hi Zac,

Let me put this across to our Development Team to get their opinion. I will update you as soon as I can.

Regards,

Mark

Hi Zac,

I hope all is well,

I have since discussed this with our development team and below is a summary of where we stand from the advanced/additional questions raised.

As it stands there is not an ability to copy across reports. This Enhancement initially was about extending the existing copy field capability in report builder to calculated fields - that copy happens instantly within the report. Copying across reports would require some kind of clipboard to be developed which as it stands we are not looking to implement said feature.

NIOTE: Reusing fields across reports can also be done by creating the field at View level.

RE: Calculated field builder - we have had many discussions around how this works and how users tend not to like the sequential nature of it, ie. it is not a free text editor, instead you build it block by block. We have on the roadmap a project to rebuild the calculated field builder but it is not currently prioritised (we are aware that this has been raised).

Regards,

Mark

Hi Mark,

Thank you very much for discussing that with the team and providing a prompt response! Noted regarding the copying across reports; editing the view is not an ideal solution for our case as the users creating a report and needing to reuse fields don't have access to edit the views. Additionally, the views are templated and updates pushed to all customers, the custom fields of one customer would be overwritten when an updated view rolled out.

I will await the update to the calculated field builder; I think that will be the best resolution to our quirky issue!

Thank you,

Zac

Hi Zac,

Thanks for understanding. Please check in any time for updates. I would be more than happy to assist where I can.

Regards,

Mark