Item Parameter Groups

1Purpose #

Item parameters are the extra fields captured against a voucher's item lines — length, colour, finish, grade. A business with a few dozen of them needs somewhere to put them, and this is it.

A group carries no behaviour of its own. It does not decide which parameters a product gets, it does not appear on a voucher, and it changes no value. It is organisation only.

2Step by step #

Parameter groups organise measured item parameters (dimensions, purity, counts) into a tree.

1. Press Add (F3) , name the group — Dimensions — and pick a parent if it nests.
2. Press Save (F5) ; define the parameters themselves on the Product Parameters master.

3How to use it #

1. The page opens with a blank row ready to key. Enter moves from cell to cell, and Enter off the last cell of the last row starts another — so a run of entries needs no mouse.
2. Turn Primary on for a top-level heading. Turn it off and the Under Group pick-list wakes up and becomes required.
3. Add Group (F3) appends a row. The bin icon at the end of a row removes it; the row disappears from the grid and is deleted when you Save.
4. Save (F5) writes every changed row in one go, after a confirmation. Only rows you actually touched are sent.
5. Refresh (F2) re-reads the list and discards unsaved edits.
6. Type in the search box to narrow the grid. Columns also sort and filter.
7. The State column shows what Save will do with each row: New , Changed , Delete , or blank for untouched.

4Field details #

• Group Name — required, and unique across every group. This is what the Product Parameters master shows.
• Description — optional free text explaining what belongs in the group.
• Primary — on for a top-level group. A primary group has no parent and the Under Group cell is switched off.
• Under Group — the parent. Required whenever Primary is off. Only groups already saved can be picked as a parent, so save a new parent before filing anything under it.
• Inactive — retires the group without deleting it. An inactive group keeps its existing parameters but stops being offered for new ones.
• State — read-only; what Save will do with the row.

5Shortcut keys #

• F2 — Refresh: re-read the list, discarding unsaved edits.
• F3 — Add Group.
• F5 — Save (opens the confirmation).
• Esc — close the confirmation or an open dialog.
• Enter — move to the next cell; off the last cell of the last row it starts a new row and puts the caret in it.
• Tab — move to the next cell without the new-row behaviour.

Shortcuts belong to whichever copy of the page has focus, so a second tab of this page does not steal them.

6Why is a pick-list empty? #

• Under Group lists the groups on this very page. An empty list means nothing has been saved yet — create and save a primary group first, then file others under it.
• A group never appears in its own Under Group list, and neither does any group already sitting beneath it: nesting cannot loop.
• A row you have just typed but not saved cannot be a parent yet — it has no identity for the child to point at. Save, then file.

7Rules and integrity #

• Group names are unique. The duplicate is refused before saving, and refused again by the server if it somehow gets through (a second browser tab, say).
• A non-primary group must name a parent. The desktop application enforced the same rule.
• Nesting cannot loop — a group cannot sit under itself, directly or through a chain.
• A group that still has parameters filed under it, or other groups beneath it, cannot be deleted. Move them first; the refusal names what is in the way.
• Rows are saved individually by state, so an untouched row is never rewritten — it keeps its identity and its created-by / created-on stamps. Editing a row stamps modified-by / modified-on.
• Adding, changing and deleting are each permission-checked by the database. A restricted user gets an explicit refusal, not a silent no-op.
• The blank row waiting at the bottom is scaffolding: it is never saved and never counts as an incomplete row.