Hi, I have created a notes helpdesk, and hardware software application, I now would like to have the following information displayed with in both application when the UserID is entered, then the UserName, Address, Title, Password, Dept, Office,and PhoneNo, will automatically be filled in. I know that I sould use a dblookup,or @columnlookup, I don’t know the difference but I do not know how to start, I have read that I need to set up columns, in either a view, or form. I am new to notes as far application are concerned, and I have been designated as the notes developer for my office, I would also like it so that when a tech is entering in information in the helpdesk portion a pop up box will display the hardware that belongs to that user, is this at all possible, I really do need help, and I am becoming more confused as I read, I do not understand what “”" this means.?, We are using the helpdesk portion now, it is on our server, but one of the techs is unable to see the doclink when I send him a request to solve a poblem, everyone sees the doclink except for him, I have check my database access control, and it is the same as for the other techs? HELP
Subject: @dblook
I know that I sould use a dblookup,or @columnlookup
D’you maybe mean @dbcolumn rather than @columnlookup? The former exists, the latter doesn’t. Anyway, the big difference is that dblookup gets a value or possibly a list of values from a view; dbcolumn gets the entire contents of a column, which you don’t want. More specifically, @dblookup gets a value (or values) from a designated column in a view where the value in the first sorted column is equal to a given key value. @dbcolumn gets the entire contents of the indicated column in the view.
It sounds like you may be in need of more help than you can feasably ask for on a forum like this, but I’ll sketch out the process I’d follow to get what you need. The first thing you need is a database containing documents with the information you want (or they can be in the same database; for the moment, we’ll assume there’s a separate database). Create a view in that separate database displaying those documents, sorted by UserID and with columns displaying the information you want looked up (name, address, hardware, etc.). For each column in you want data from that view, you’ll have a computed field on the form where you want that information displayed. For the value of the field, you’ll have a formula like this:
@DbLookup( “” ; “yourserver” : “db.nsf” ; “My View” ; UserID ; 1; [FailSilent])
This assumes (in order of what the parameters mean):
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You don’t worry about cacheing or the other folderol around that first parameter. It’s not unimportant, but that first “” is a useful placeholder while you go and figure out the rest of the formula.
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The database where your help desk is looking for information is named db.nsf and is on a server named yourserver.
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The view in db.nsf displaying the data you want is named My View.
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The field on the document in the help desk containing the user ID (which is what you’ll use as a lookup key in the other database) is named UserID. Note that there are no quotations around that. It’s telling Notes to use the contents of the field named UserID.
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You want the contents of the first column in the view.
That “[FailSilent]” thing tells Notes that if there aren’t any documents matching the criteria (that is, having the value of the current document’s UserID field in the first sorted column), return a null value rather than declaring an error, which can be deeply irritating. Anyway, if you’ve set up your lookup view properly, you should see the desired information appear in fields on your help desk document once a user ID is entered (you may need to press F9 to force Notes to refresh the document).