Adding Variables and Navigating through the Template

Adding Variables to the Template

1. In the Selected Variables list, click Add in the toolbar.

A new variable appears in the variable list - .



Figure 1 - Creating a new variable

The new variable will have default template-specific property values that you can change later (go to Variable Properties for more information).

2. Click Save.

Fixing the Position of Variables

To fix the positions of all variables in the current flattened template:

1. click the Fix by button in the Selected Variables page toolbar, the Fix by... overlay opens - .



Figure 2 - The Fix by... overlay

This overlay allows you to apply the selected parameter to all variables or just those you have already selected. The options are:

• Position - The column positions specified in the Start and Finish columns will be fixed. Use this function to maintain the column positions when updating the Template with the changes in the project running the “Update from project” process, and to maintain the column positions when exporting Survey data.
• Length - The variable length specified in the Length column will be fixed. Use this function to maintain the variable length when updating the Template with the changes in the project running the “Update from project” process, and to maintain the length when exporting Survey data.
• Not fixed - changes the selected variables or all variables to Fix by = None. This means the variables are not fixed by positions or length.
2. Select Position.
3. Select Change selected or Change all as appropriate.

Note: In the event of hierarchical Survey Data Templates, these steps must be repeated for each loop level.

Navigating Through Variables

You can navigate through variables and view their properties, sort variables by their properties, filter the variables to be displayed, and search for variables by their name, label and values.

Templates generated from Forsta projects with loops (refer to the Professional Authoring documentation for more information) contain hierarchies where questions within loops represent child levels. Every hierarchical level in these templates is a separate file. These files are edited separately from each other. You can select a particular level in the template by clicking the drop-down menu in the Levels field - .

Important
To maintain the required look and functionality of Projects based on templates that contain hierarchies, it is recommended that you DO NOT DELETE system variables (see Variable Types for more information).

Figure 3 - Example of a template with hierarchical levels

Variables are displayed in the upper panel of the Triple-S Template Editor page as a table, which also displays the common properties of the variables. When you select a variable in this upper panel, the lower panel displays the type-specific properties of this variable (go to Variable Properties for more information).

Variables can be sorted by all common properties. To sort variables:

1. Click the header cell of the column displaying the property by whose value you want to sort variables.

Variables will be sorted by the value of the property in ascending order.

2. Click the header cell once again to sort variables in descending order.

The list of variables can be searched for variables by name, label and value.

3. Click Find on the toolbar above the upper-right panel.

The Find Variables dialog appears - .



Figure 4 - The Find Variables dialog

4. Select the properties by which you want to search, by checking the corresponding checkboxes.
5. Type the search string in the Find field.
6. Check Match case to enable a case-sensitive search.
7. Click Find.

When a variable that meets the specified searching criteria is found, it is highlighted in blue in the list of variables.

8. Click Find again to navigate to the next variable meeting the search criteria.

In the event no variables matching the search string are found, a window displaying the notification message appears - :

Figure 5 - Example of the Search Results Notification window when no variables are found

You can filter variables to be displayed by their common properties as well as assign to them logical variable as filters (go to Variable Properties for more information).