Is there a way to get the field description onto the report?

I created a variable which is used for the sort order and would like to display that into the header. For instance our field name for item number is ITNO and I would like it to say Item Number instead.

I know I write some JSP to obtain the text from the display field of the dropdown but I was wondering if WebFOCUS has a way to do this.

Eric

You should put that description in the master file
or when it is a local defined field you rename it by

PRINT
ITNO AS 'Item number'
etc

is this what you want?

Frank

Eric,

This is what Frank was referring to regarding the MASTER:

FILENAME=CAR,SUFFIX=FOC
SEGNAME=ORIGIN,SEGTYPE=S1
FIELDNAME=COUNTRY,COUNTRY,A10,FIELDTYPE=I,
TITLE='COUNTRY OF ORIGIN',$

Tom

Sorry I think I may have stated what I was looking for wrong. I was refering to putting it into the header and not the column titling.

The user has a dropdown for &DIMENSION which lets them sort by ITNO (Item NUmber), ITNM (Item name) ect and I need the Header to say "Item Number" if that is the &DIMENSION they selected.

So in the page header I have the following code:
Sort By: &DIMENSION

Which right now outputs:
Sort By: ITNO

Eric

I would either:

in the report: use Dialogue Manager and DECODE the &DIMENSION values ITNO, ITNM to &DIMENSION_NAME

or

in the HTML launch page: use JavaScript to pass both the document.forms[0].DIMENSION.options[DIMENSION.selectedIndex].text and document.forms[0].DIMENSION.options[DIMENSION.selectedIndex].value

I was actually thinking of using DECODE, but wanted to avoid that if there were a lot of values in the drop down, but this can work for now.

I already use JSP on some reports to do this but here I have to setup more variables to accomplish this.

Thanks guys,

Eric

If you want this generalised for many fields, put the text you want for each field in the TITLE or HELPMESSAGE of the mfd. Then:

CHECK FILE Fn HOLD
TABLE FILE HOLD
PRINT HELPMESSAGE 
IF FIELD EQ &DIMENSION
ON TABLE SAVE
END
-RUN
-READ SAVE &HM.A30

You should be able to put this into a single -INCLUDE.

If its a small list, then in your fex:
-DEFAULT &BYFIELD = 'ITNO';
-SET &BYFIELDNAME=DECODE &BYFIELD
('ITNO' 'ITEM NUMBER'
'PROD' 'PRODUCT NAME'
'BRND' 'BRAND NAME' ELSE '');
then in your heading
HEADING
"sorted by &BYFIELDNAME "
...(nb: leave blank space before closing " )
or, if its a long list, then
you can do this with a decode file.
Make these decode files in advance and park them on your server in your apps directory , then you have them ready whenever you need them in any fex.
TABLE FILE something
SUM COMPUTE BLANK/A1=' '; CODENAME
BY CODE
ON TABLE SET HOLDLIST PRINTONLY
ON TABLE SAVE AS DECODE01 FORMAT ALPHA
END
...now you can use this list in two ways
-DEFAULT &MYFIELD = '1234';
-SET &MYFIELDNAME=DECODE &MYFIELD(DECODE01);
or similarly in a define where you're putting some codename on every code field.
You should be good to go, now, .eric.

Some good tips, thanks Alan and Susannah. I am just using the set/decode right now as there are only 5 options for this report. But your method for large lists should be helpful for the future.

Eric