hii ,

description field holds the upto 1500chars,

yes, it is possible to increase the description field. 

How can I increase the character. Ours is only allowed for up to 35 character. 

 ok do you have HD6 data type in data types?

if in case it having change the data types of the description field (Tables, screens) and validate it .

This is what we have. What should it be 

hii change type AX3 to HD6

Will it work properly? And how it will affect indexes in which ITMDESC1 field is involved?

Would love to know if people think this is best practice to do or to add an additional field.  I would be worried about all the other screens and references this field would have, even to standard reports?

Thanks

it is not affect the other fields

It is not a best practice to change the length of a standard data type as it may cause problems in future upgrades. Also, you may get truncated text or unwarranted error messages on some functions. The ideal way is to use the Description 2 field as it shows up on most of the transaction and Inquiry Screen.

Alternatively you can add a new description field (200 Chars) to the product master but keep the scope limited to certain transaction and inquiry screens. 

Is this still the best method to adding characters in the product description field? 

We did something a little different so the change was unobtrusive to the system as a whole.

1. We added a new field of 90 characters to hold the long description to the product file.
2.  We modified the product screen so that you could type in the 90 character description
   1. We added the 90 character description near the top with indicators for approximate 30 characters breaks.
   2. On save the 90 character description is pushed back into the 3 30 character fields.

This was less intrusive and didn't require changes everywhere.    We could put the field where the client wanted it.

We later added the long description and the ability to modify it to several screens including PO and SO.   We put the long description on some forms.

We also added a multi word multi search on the 90 character field so you could search "red, bike"  and it will list every item that contains the word red and bike.   This is on sales orders, invoices, PO and probably other places.

Willing to "share" code.   Parts in Version 11 and 12.

Please could you share the code with me?

We also have an urgent requirement to increase the description size and our workaround was also to split the description over the 3 fields, but manually.  The problem then was that we couldn't search for a specific word/phrase over the 3 fields.

Why not possible to search? It is possible to add to the left browse window combined field, e.g., [F:ITM]DES0 - F:ITM]DES1 - F:ITM]DES2.

You can search as you suggested sort of but putting a concatenated field on the screen.  But you can only search one value like Glove. 

You cannot search "Glove, Cotton, Red " and get every item that contains those three words in the description.  Notice the blue ones have red in textuRED.  

>>Please could you share the code with me?

Sure,  but it's above my pay grade.  I haven't written much code since the 1990's.   So i would can get the contract programmers that wrote this to my specifications (I do a lot of specifications still) to either package it up or install it for you.  I can get a quote.

My ultimate goal is a repository of what we used to call "dealer ware" in the Sage Pro source code product world.  It's code that is available to "share" but is basically not supported.    People do a lot of mods and many of them are generic and not generally resellable but they might help others.    Sage Pro had a place to put these mods for dealers to share. 

Thanks for the reply.  I would appreciate a quote but what concerns me is that it may not be supported?  Modifications like this are a nightmare when upgrading to another version, which is why I wanted to see/test the code before making an expensive acquisition.

I love your idea of "dealer-ware", it would be so useful.

"Sage Pro had a place to put these mods for dealers to share. "  Do they still?

Why cannot search "Glove, Cotton, Red"? Change filter to Contains and write instead "Glove*Cotton*Red" and here you go!

>>Sage Pro had a place to put these mods for dealers to share. "  Do they still?

Yes.   For Sage Pro "dealers" but not for X3.

Sage Pro was discontinued on March 31, 2014 (Which Stephen Kelly - President of Sage at the time, stood on the Stage at the New Orleans convention said was a mistake).    

Sage Pro was a lot like Sage 100 in feature set BUT you could get all the source code with it and modify it.  As a result the dealer base tended to be programmers/techie's.   It gave rise to a unique community. 

It was also a problem for Sage because folks would buy it, modify it and drop off maintenance.   This does not fit anyone's software sales model today.

The other reason it was dropped is that the language was Microsoft Foxpro which was discontinued with either a Foxpro or MS SQL database.    Still the software runs fine on W10 and we've been able to upgrade most versions to Windows Server 2019 and SQL 2019.   We are supporting well over a 100 clients on various versions.    Still lives.  

It would be nice to have such a community for Sage X3.   

>>I love your idea of "dealer-ware", it would be so useful.

I love my ideas too.  The devil is in the details of how to run it and pay for it.  The Sage Pro "Loop" was free but as things got small it became a pay to play forum and it is down to about 40 active members i think. 

If there were independent Sage Pro consultants who could then pick up work off their contributed mods, it might help.   But most everyone doing Sage X3 works for a larger organization and there is no budget or support in house for such a repository or anyone even maintaining a list of mods.   I have asked several companies for a list of mods done in X3 as a catalog.  Still waiting.   Where's the value to these organization or their programmers?   They make more recreating the mod from scratch every time. 

We should start another thread on this.   

Yes, that works perfectly if the data is arranged in exactly that order.   However Red*cotton*glove returns no results.  So the operator has to guess at the correct order to ask the question.   I think that's asking a bit much of the operators assuming they are human.  

Is there a way to search in any position on multiple values? 

5 minutes idea, use several concatenated fields at the same time, e.g., create 3 concatenated fields instead of one, in the first field write Glove, in the second field Cotton and in the third field Glove, this will show you needed result.

Please could you also share the code with me?

5 months back it didn't occur to me but i have been working on a project with product attributes and your idea combined with the product attributes would bring structure to it.   The issue is that product attributes are not easy to search for so you have to do something about that. 

Sure.   Not sure how we get this too you and there will probably be a small charge from the programmer to pull it out.   I guess i could try to push everything out to a patch.  There are two parts.   The search and the 90 character description field which pushes back to the 3 normal fields when enterred. 

Just a few notes on the item description fields.

The standard data type is used in over 200 fields and remember that there is also a translatable description field to worry about.

We have increased the field by creating new data types for 80 characters but we only were working with non inventory items in the purchasing area.

There are many built in traps to catch you out.

As an example, the creating a PO from a Purchase Request programme had the field length hard coded so even though both of our fields had 80 characters only 35 were pulled through.

Historically Sage R&D have said no to changing the field length and I suspect it is because there are hidden problems throughout the sub programmes but that it is only my opinion.

It would be a useful enhancement especially now we have reactive sizing of screens.

>>There are many built in traps to catch you out.

My modification doesn't change the original file length.   

We added a 90 character field.   Then we wrote a modification into the product screen so that when someone typed in a 90 character I automatically filled the three thirty character fields.    

You can leave the 30 character field, use the modified field or lengthen another field on other places like PO's or SO to also be 90 characters and match.   It's still somewhat intrusive but less intrusive.

Editorial comment:  I understand the reluctance to make changes to intrusive areas like this but isn't that the point of X3?   To have the software your way?   Otherwise just buy a cheaper completely canned package and have it their way.