Use Descriptive Flexfields

You can add descriptive flexfields (DFF) to a Table or Form-over-Table layout during layout creation. You can also add descriptive flexfields (DFF) to existing forms and tables using the Form Field Manager or Table Column Manager.

Create a Layout Using Descriptive Flexfields

When you create a layout, you can add descriptive flexfields (DFF) from a child business object to the parent layout if the child is in a "one-to-one" relationship with the parent. DFFs are indicated in the New Layout Setup wizard by an Information icon (Information icon).

Top-level polymorphic business objects as well as child business objects with a "one-to-many" relationship with their parent can also be added to the layout as you would any other business object. See Create a Table Layout in an Excel Workbook and Create a Form-over-Table Layout in an Excel Workbook.

To determine the relationship of a child business object to its parent, check its Cardinality setting. See Check the Cardinality of Child Polymorphic Business Objects.

To create a layout with DFFs:

  1. Create a new worksheet for your layout and click Designer to launch the New Layout Setup wizard.
  2. Follow the instructions in the wizard, selecting the DFF's ancestor when prompted to choose a business object.

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    Description of the illustration bo-hierarchy-poly.png

    In this example, the Expense Reports business object is selected for the parent layout.

  3. Next, select either Table Layout or Form-over-Table for your layout.
    In this example, we'll use a Form-over-Table layout.
  4. When prompted to select descendant business objects, select the DFF business object and any other descendant business objects you want to include.

    In this example, both Expenses and Expenses Dff are selected. Expenses DFF represents a DFF that is in a one-to-one relationship with Expenses, as indicated by the Information icon (Information icon).


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    If you select Expenses DFF, the add-in adds the flexfields to the child layout, Expenses.

    If you chose to create a Form-over-Table layout, the add-in creates a layout with Expense Reports in the form and Expenses in the table. If you instead chose a Table layout, the add-in creates a dependent Table layout for Expenses.

  5. When you reach the final screen in the wizard, review the details of the new layout, then click Finish.

In this example, the add-in creates a Form-over-Table layout with Expense Reports in the form and Expenses in the table as shown in this image:


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The add-in adds the Expense Type flexfields from Expenses DFF to the form (bordered in red). The flexfields include a "discriminator" field ("Expense Type"), a global segment ("Merchant Name"), and five context-sensitive segments ("Flight Class", "Flight Type", "Check-in Date", "Checkout Date", and "Attendee Count"). The context-sensitive segments are dependent on the value of the Expense Type field (in the first row, "Airfare").

Note:

Context-sensitive columns for all possible discriminator values are included in the table. However, only those cells in a row that are relevant to the value in the discriminator field are editable. All other context-sensitive cells are read-only (grayed out).

If the required flexfields do not appear in the layout by default, you can add them to your form or table from the Layout Designer. See Add Descriptive Flexfields to a Layout.

You can also show or hide context-sensitive segments based on the discriminator value. See Show or Hide Context-Sensitive Columns in a Table Layout.

Add Descriptive Flexfields to a Layout

You can add descriptive flexfields (DFF) to forms and tables using the Form Field Manager or Table Column Manager and place them anywhere in the form or table. Descriptive flexfields are a type of polymorphic business object that has a one-to-one relationship with its parent. See Overview of Descriptive Flexfields for more information on DFFs.

Note:

For polymorphic business objects in a one-to-many relationship, refer to Create a Layout Using Descriptive Flexfields instead.

To add DFFs to a layout:

  1. Open the worksheet with the layout that you want to modify.
  2. Click either the Form or Columns tab in the Layout Designer as needed.
  3. Click the Manage Form Fields or Manage Columns icon (Manage Columns) to add your DFF.

    Available DFFs are identified by the title of the discriminator field (in this case, "Region") and appear at the bottom of the list of available fields. The field ID is the discriminator field ID ("__FLEX_Context").

  4. Select the DFF from the Available Fields list.
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    Description of the illustration add-dff-field.png

    You can also change the order of fields in the form or table by dragging and dropping fields in the Selected Fields list.

  5. Click Done.

The associated segments appear in the layout in the following order: global segments, the discriminator, and context-sensitive segments.

Note:

Context-sensitive columns for all possible discriminator values are included in the table. However, only those cells in a row that are relevant to the value in the discriminator field are editable. All other context-sensitive cells are read-only (grayed out).