Dumb question from a newbie...be kind...

[tromba99]

I have been trying for a while to get what I thought would be the simple task of getting pop-up type messages to appear when certain criteria are met and have had zero luck.

My OpenEdge Development: Progress 4GL Reference Manual (along with many examples I have found on-line) led me to believe the following code would do the job:

MESSAGE "I got here" VIEW-AS ALERT-BOX INFORMATION BUTTONS OK

However when this (or similar) code is hit; I get no message on the screen but the message appears in a log instead.

Additional information that may be important is that this code is being called from a product configurator I am developing for Epicor 9.04.

What do I need to do to get this to work?

Thanks

 

[TomBascom]

It sounds like you have previously redirected OUTPUT to a log file.

Of course a lot depends on your specific code but you may be able to fix it by simply saying "OUTPUT CLOSE." Prior to your message statement.

 

[tromba99]

Tom,

Thanks for the reply, but I tried adding "OUTPUT CLOSE." just before the creation of my message and the results were the same as before.

As far as code specifics go....

The program is called from an Epicor product configurator I am developing using a statement similar to "run price.p INPUT Item, Qty, OUTPUT Price" where Item, Qty and Price are controls on the Epicor form.

The program itself does not make any reference to OUTPUT other than the OUTPUT parameters used in interacting with the configurator for pricing calculations.

The message I am receiving gets written to the same server log where error messages are written.

This path is most likely set somewhere in Epicor.

I guess it is possible that this is suppressing my alert-box, but that seems pretty silly if true.

I wonder if it is necessary to "pass" the alert-box back to the configurator in some manner similar to how the price is returned.

Any thoughts?

 

[TomBascom]

Ok, that clarifies a bit. Now it sounds a bit different

This all starts with an action on a form somewhere that passes some data to another program ("price.p"). Price.p then calls the program that you have written which has the message statement inside of it?

I'm guessing that price.p runs on an app-server. That would explain why the message is in a "server log" (the name of that log file and a sample of the messages near the one that you are writing would likely verify that supposition).

If I am correct about that then you cannot do it that way. You would need to return the value that you want displayed all the way back to the form and use code that runs in the context of the form to display the message.

 

[tromba99]

That was what I was afraid of.

I can load a character control on the form with the message, but it won't have the impact on the user's activity the way an alert-box would have.

That was going to be my fall back if I could not get the other to work.

At least, now I know "I can't get there from here" and can move on.

Thanks for you help.

 

[Wonsil]

The Vantage/Product Configurator does not use Progress screens (Thick .Net client or HTML). The Progress code runs at the server and that's why you can't get a popup message to display at the terminal. When I want to get the user's attention, I'll do two things. I'll create a Status box that displays issues below. If I want them not to be able to continue, I'll create a hidden mandatory field called "Fix_Errors". If all is good, I'll populate the field, if not, I'll empty it. When the user clicks for the Next screen or tries to finish, they'll get a pop up. Not pretty but it's effective.

Mark W.

 

[tromba99]

Wonsil,

Thanks for the reply.

I will implement that very idea.

In the 6 months+ that we have been working on the roll out of Epicor for our company, we have found the development environment to be the most generic and silly thing any of us have ever worked in. We are constantly forced to do things that are "not pretty but effective".

It should have been sold in a white box with black, block lettering text.


Thanks again for your help. It is appreciated.

 

[Wonsil]

There's a couple of newsgroups that may be helpful for you:

The Vantage Yahoo! Group (very active, requires registration but free) http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/

The Epicor Users Group (Annual Fee for membership but there are other benefits) http://epicorusers.org/

Mark W.

 

[GregTomkins]

we have found the development environment to be the most generic and silly thing any of us have ever worked in

Is that a slam against the Progress non-Eclipse product? If so, you're being overly generous. It's hard to believe how lame that thing is.

I just started using the Eclipse product recently; I was delayed from doing so for years due to cost and RoundTable hassles, which is another story.

Anyway, my point is, the Eclipse environment, if you can suck up the cost, ain't bad at all, even compared to mainstream products like VS. And it is obviously 100 years ahead of the non-Eclipse product. (But then, so is Notepad...)