Process of Creating Advisor Feature Tables

Creating an Advisor feature table requires you to complete the following steps:

1. Analyzing the Problem Before Creating Feature Tables

2. Creating an Advisor Feature Table

3. Designing an Advisor Feature Table

4. Entering Data in the Advisor Feature Table

Analyzing the Problem Before Creating Feature Tables

You analyze the problem by dividing your data into features and selecting default values.

This task is a step in Process of Creating Advisor Feature Tables.

First, you must decide which features the user can select.

For example, if your product is a sports car, make a list for each configurable feature. If the sports car comes with manual transmission, the user does not need to make a selection. Therefore, transmission is not a feature.

However, if the user has a choice in exterior color, you need a feature table to hold the possible values for exterior color. For this feature, you might name the feature table EXT_COLOR.

These feature values may also serve as answers to questions in an Advisor application. For example, in response to the question, ”What exterior color would you like your car to have?” a user can select from a drop-down list of exterior colors.

Next, you must determine the possible values for each feature. For example, for the exterior color feature, determine what colors are offered. You populate the feature table with these values, for example Red, Black, and Silver.

Next, determine the default value for each feature. For example, you may decide that black will be the most commonly selected value for the exterior color feature.

Note: You can also use Trigger and Target feature tables to determine default values based on previous user selections. For more information, see "Creating Trigger and Target Feature Tables".

Your compiled list of features and values for Sports Car might look like this:

Sports Car Features

• Exterior Color

  • Black (default)

  • Silver

  • Red

• Interior Color

  • Black (default)

  • Tan

• Sun Roof

  • No (default)

  • Yes

• Model

  • Basic (default)

  • Turbo

You use this information when creating your feature tables in the next steps.

Creating an Advisor Feature Table

To create a feature table, you create a record in the feature tables list with basic information about the table.

This task is a step in "Process of Creating Advisor Feature Tables".

To create an Advisor feature table

1. Navigate to Administration - Product, then Advisor Pagesets and My Pagesets.

2. Drill down on the Name field of a pageset.

3. Select the Feature Tables tab and, from the Menu, choose New Record.

   A new Feature Table record appears.

4. Enter a name, without spaces, for the feature table.

   The name automatically converts to all capital letters. The name must start with a letter and can contain the letters A-Z, the numbers 0-9, and an underscore character (as in EXTERIOR_COLOR).

5. Select the type of table from the drop down list. The following are the table type values:

   • Linked

     For more information, see "Creating Linked Advisor Feature Tables".

   • Standard

   • Target

     For more information, see "Creating Trigger and Target Feature Tables".

   • Trigger

     For more information, see "Creating Trigger and Target Feature Tables".

6. If you are creating a linked table, click the Linked To Table button to open a picklist from which you can select the table to link to.

7. Enter any notes. This step is optional.

Designing an Advisor Feature Table

In the Designer view, you design the feature table in which you enter your feature data.

This task is a step in "Process of Creating Advisor Feature Tables".

Each feature table must contain at least three columns: CODE, DESC, and DEFAULT, which are described in Table 7-1. When you create a feature table in Advisor, these columns are automatically created.

Table 7-1 Required Columns for Feature Tables

Column	Description
CODE	Abbreviated value for the feature defined in the DESC column. Contains unique values (within the column) that identify the rows in the table.
DESC	Full-length text description of the feature value. This value represents the text that appears in input UI controls on display pages in the application.
DEFAULT	Defines the initial display value for an input UI control that takes its content from the feature table. Type ”default” in the row that represents the default feature value and leave all other cells in the column blank.

In the Table Designer view, you can add additional columns between the DESC and DEFAULT columns to represent other aspects of a feature, such as price or a part number. There can be as many columns to a table as there are values to a feature.

To design an Advisor feature table

 

1. Navigate to Administration - Product, then Advisor Pagesets and My Pagesets.

2. Select a pageset.

3. From the Feature Tables tab, select the Designer tab.

   The Feature Table designer opens.

4. Complete the fields for the new record in the Feature Table Designer.

   The following table describes the columns in the Feature Table Designer.

   Column	Description	Optional
   Sequence	The sequence numbers determine the order in which the feature columns appear in the Feature editor. These numbers are automatically generated, but you can overwrite them.	Yes
   Column Name	Enter a column name for each feature. For example, for the CARS feature table, you might enter columns for MODEL, COLOR, and PRICE.	No
   Business Component	This column maps to the selected column (business component) in the Siebel database. For more information on using business components, see Using Siebel Tools. If the data you want to display is already available in the Siebel database, you can access the business component and field and select that data. Note: If you select a business component and field, you cannot select a class and attribute. These options are mutually exclusive.	No
   Field Name	If you selected a business component, you must also select a Field Name. Select a field name from the business component you selected.	No
   Shared	Check the Shared field to reference one row ID in a business component. All columns in the Table Designer that reference the same business component and have the Shared field selected are populated with data when a value is selected for any one of them. For example, you add the columns Name, Phone, Organization, and Address to your feature table, and they all reference the Contact business component. Then when you switch to the Editor View and select a value for the Organization column, values for Name, Phone, and Address are filled in.	Yes
   Class	This field is optional. This field maps to the selected class in the Siebel database. For more information on classes and attributes, see Siebel Product Administration Guide. Note: If you select a class and attribute, you cannot select a business component and field. These options are mutually exclusive.	Yes
   Attribute	If you selected a class, select an attribute for the class.	Yes
   Target Table	If the feature table is a trigger table, you may need to choose a target table. For more information, see "Creating Trigger and Target Feature Tables".	No
   Notes	Enter any notes.	Yes

   
   

Entering Data in the Advisor Feature Table

After you have designed a feature table, enter data in the table by switching to the Feature Table Editor view. In the Feature Editor view, you enter the row and cell data for feature table columns.

This task is a step in "Process of Creating Advisor Feature Tables".

The Row type column provides a picklist for Target tables. For information about creating Trigger and Target feature tables, see "Creating Trigger and Target Feature Tables". For all other feature table types, use DATA, which is selected by default. The Sequence column determines the order in which the rows are published.

For more information on creating, designing, and populating feature tables, see "Process of Creating Advisor Feature Tables".

To enter data in an Advisor pageset feature table

1. Navigate to Administration - Product, then Advisor Pagesets and Feature Tables.

2. Select a Feature Table.

3. Select the Editor tab.

4. In the Feature Table editor, enter the sequence of the features as they appear in the associated UI control. This is an optional step.

   The sequence numbers are automatically generated. You can override them by entering a different number.

5. Enter a code value for the feature.

   For example, for Black you might use the value BK and for Blue you might use the value BL. Make code values short so that they are easy to identify in the Configuration table cells, but meaningful so that you do not need to reopen the feature table to remember what the values stand for.

6. Enter a full description of the feature.

7. Fill in information for any other columns you have added.

8. Select the value you want to appear by default in the associated UI control and enter DEFAULT in the DEFAULT column.

9. If you have a PRICE column, enter additional costs for particular features.

   For example, if a red car costs $500 more than a black car, in the PRICE column for the RED row, you would enter 500. Later, in the PRICE column of the configuration table, you can add this column to the base price column. For more information, see "Runtime Access to Pricing Information in Advisor Applications".