Exact Synergy Enterprise

Creating multiple or weekly requests

Menu paths

Workflow à Entry à Requests à Requests: New
Click Create in the left menu or toolbar, and then select Request in the Entities section.
Click Workflow in the left menu, and then click New in the Workflow screen.
Click Requests in the left menu, and then click New in the Requests screen.

Introduction

Creating a Multiple or Week request can save you considerable time when you need to create several similar requests with varying information for some of the request fields.

Consider this scenario as an example. You want to send five requests, each to a different trainee, asking each trainee to read the course document linked to the request. You want each trainee to read a different course document. In this case, you can create a Multiple request using the same description but with different person and document filled in the Person and Document fields respectively. When you submit the multiple request, the system will generate five requests, one to each trainee. In each request, all the information is similar except the linked document.

In another example, you want to schedule a week of training classes for a trainee. The classes will be on the same topic but are scheduled for different time slots for different days of the week. In this case, you can use the same description for each request but with different start time and end time values for each day of the week. Once you submit the request, the system will generate one request for each of the scheduled days of the training week to the trainee. These requests will contain the same description but with different start and end times.

Depending on the Entry section of the General tab in a request type definition, a request type can be used to create:

Multiple requests if the number at Multiple in the Entry section of a request type is not zero.
Week requests if the Week check box is selected and the Multiple field in the Entry section of a request type is not zero.

Based on these conditions, not all Multiple request types can be used to create a Week request but all Week request types can be used to create Multiple requests. For more information on the General tab of a request type definition, see Creating and modifying request types – General tab.

For information on creating Single and Process flow request entries, see New request menu. For more information on the request form, such as the action buttons, workflow steps, fields, and action icons, see Creating and modifying requests.

Roles & rights

All users can create multiple or weekly requests. However, whether you can create multiple or weekly requests of a certain type depends on the settings in the Create section under the Flow tab of the request type definition. For more information, see Creating and modifying request types – Flow tab.

Notes:

For more details on function rights, go to System à Setup à Security à Function rights.
For more details on roles, go to System à Setup à Security à Roles.

What version are you using?

The information in this document is based on product update 249.

How do I create Multiple requests?

Click Multiple next to the description of the request type that you want to create.
Select the respective check boxes in the Columns section to display the columns required in the request.
Click New.
Fill in the required information. The fields that are displayed depend on the selected request.
Click Submit.

How do I create Week requests?

Click Week next to the description of the request type that you want to create.
Select the respective check boxes in the Columns section to display the columns required in the request.
In the Values - Daily section, select the respective check boxes to define which field will have different information filled in each day of the week.
Click New.
Fill in the required information. The fields that are displayed depend on the selected request.
Click Submit.

Buttons

Fields

Request type

This field displays the ID and description of the request type.

Entry

This field displays the entry of the request type.

Columns section

Select the relevant check boxes for the request fields where you want to enter different information in each request generated by the Multiple or Week request. You may see different fields depending on the request type. If you are creating a weekly request, some of the fields are displayed in the Values - Daily section.

If for instance, the Person and Description check boxes are selected, the Multiple request form will contain a table where you can select a different person and type a different description in each row. When you submit the request, the system will generate several requests, one for each selected person, and display a different description in each request. Other information not selected in the Columns section will be the same in all of the generated requests.

After clicking New, you will be presented with a Multiple request form. While all other request fields are in the request form similar to a Single request, the fields selected in this section will be in a table with the number of rows entered in the Layout section. If you have selected the Remarks: Request and/or Remarks: Workflow check boxes, you can add timestamp under the Remarks: Request and/or Remarks: Workflow columns when creating multiple requests by using the shortcut key "ALT-T".

For each row, the fields selected in the Columns section make up the columns of the table in the new request screen. The following screen is an example of the table:

When you submit the Multiple request, the system generates several requests, one for each row in the table. In each request, the values and information in the other fields of the request are the same but the values for the fields in the table will vary in each request based on the information you entered in the table. Based on this screen example, the differences are in the Person and Description fields. Since the Person fields are different, each of the two requests will be created for two different people and the description for each request will vary.

Values - Daily section

Select the relevant check boxes for the request fields where you want to enter different information for each day of the week. Only the Duration, Start time, End time, Quantity 1, and Quantity 2 fields are available in this section. When you are creating a Week request, these fields are moved from the Columns section to this section.

For an example, the Start time and End time check boxes are selected so you can enter different start time and end time values for each day of the week.

After clicking New, you will be presented with the Week request form. This form will contain a table with the number of rows entered in the Layout section. For each row, there are two groups of columns. The first group contains the fields selected in the Columns section. The second group of columns contains seven main columns for each day of the week starting from the date entered in Week (Start) in the Layout section.

Under these seven main columns are the sub-columns for each of the fields selected in the Values - Daily section. The following screen is an example of the table:

When you submit the Week request, the system generates several requests, one for each day of the week where the daily values are entered in each row. Information in fields not in the table will be the same across all requests generated using this Week request.

Layout section

Week (Start)

Type or select the start date of the weekly request. The seven daily columns in the Week request form will start from this date.

Note: This is available only when creating a weekly request.

Rows

Type the number of requests (in the Multiple request) or requests sets (in the Week request) to be generated. This will determine the number of rows of the table in the request form. The box next to it displays the maximum rows you can use as defined in the request type definition (the Multiple field in the Entry section under the General tab).

In a Multiple request, the number of rows is the maximum number of requests to generate. For example, if you type "5" here, you will be able to generate up to five different requests in a Multiple request.

In a Week request, this is the maximum number of requests sets to generate for the week. For example, if you type "5" here, you will be able to generate up to five different requests sets for the same week. Each requests set can be used to generate up to seven requests, one for each day of the week.

Note: This number determines only the number of rows of the table in the request form. The actual number of requests generated depends on the rows (and daily columns for a Week request) that are not blank. For example, you have set the number of rows to five for a Multiple request. However, you enter information only in three rows of the table in the request form. The number of generated requests will be three. For a Week request, requests are not generated for daily columns that are blank.