InfoPath Dev

HI All

Yep im a newbie on this forum so im hoping someone will be able to assist. I have numerous infopath forms feeding into others through data source connections which all sits on sharepoint.

What the end goal im trying to achieve is select a number of fields (10 in this instance) and find the one with the latest time and have this feeding through into the other forms.

 I already have checks making sure the days match up so this is strictly time orientated at this stage.

 the error im getting is Expression must evaluate to a node-set.

xdMath:Max(-->concat(substring(../my:BtbsStatementDebitCompletedTime, 12, 2), substring(../my:BtbsStatementDebitCompletedTime, 15, 2)) <--| ../my:BtbsStatementCreditNumber)

the formula im trying is

max(concat(substring(BtbsStatementDebitCompletedTime, 12, 2), substring(BtbsStatementDebitCompletedTime, 15, 2)) | BtbsStatementCreditNumber)

Currently i have extra text boxes doing the concat substring work (this is the field BtbsStatementCreditNumber) but i was looking to get rid of these and have it all contained in the one field for ease of use and management (what im trying in the first agrument -if its called that). The above formula is for only 2 fields but this is just a test when it goes live i need it feeding 10, possibly more in other instances.

 Any help would be appreciated.

 thanks

Please give this a try:

max(eval(BtbsStatementDebitCompletedTime, 'translate(substring(., 12, 5), ":", "")') | BtbsStatementCreditNumber)

Thanks Jimmy that works perfectly, have now used on all 10 fields and works a treat!

I like to understand whats behind some of the formulas to know how to for next time, can you explain a little about what you have done, im not familiar with eval and translate (although i think i get what translate is doing in the formula)

 If its to hard no worries, im still very thankful for the assistance!

 cheers

Thanks Jimmy that works perfectly, have now used on all 10 fields and works a treat!

I like to understand whats behind some of the formulas to know how to for next time, can you explain a little about what you have done, im not familiar with eval and translate (although i think i get what translate is

Jimmy:

Please give this a try:

max(eval(BtbsStatementDebitCompletedTime, 'translate(substring(., 12, 5), ":", "")') | BtbsStatementCreditNumber)

 If its to hard no worries, im still very thankful for the assistance!

 cheers

Hi Mattsky,

So what eval() does is it takes a set of nodes, applies an XPath to each of them, and then returns a new set of nodes with the result(s).

So in the case of my example, this set is just one node.

We start with (just using a sample value here):

<BtbsStatementDebitCompletedTime>2013-08-02T10:23:23</BtbsStatementDebitCompletedTime>

The XPath formula translate(substring(., 12, 5), ":", "") is applied to this:

substring(., 12, 5) -> 10:23

translate("10:23", ":", "") -> 1023

And then this result is returned as a new set of nodes (in this case, just one node):

<item>1023</item>

And this is ready to be used with the | union operator to join with other nodes and use in the max() function.

As a side note, if there are multiple date fields involved here and you want to apply the same extraction technique to them (get characters 12-16 and remove the colon), then instead of this:

max(eval(BtbsStatementDebitCompletedTime, 'translate(substring(., 12, 5), ":", "")') | eval(BtbsStatementDebitOtherTime, 'translate(substring(., 12, 5), ":", "")') | BtbsStatementCreditNumber)

You can do this instead:

max(eval(BtbsStatementDebitCompletedTime | BtbsStatementDebitOtherTime, 'translate(substring(., 12, 5), ":", "")') | BtbsStatementCreditNumber)

Since, as mentioned above, eval() can operate on a whole set of nodes.

Thanks Again Jimmy, i actually understood that and have used the shortened version extensively now-even building them into conditional rules populating other fields!

Just out of curiosity, i am the only person i know who uses infopath and i cant seem to find the level of detail anywhere, is this classed as technical or more of a beginner formula ? Only info i cand find is real basic but nothing like im doing.

 thanks

 Hello again,

Aside from its use in the double eval trick, the eval() function does not seem to get a lot of use, and I would guess that the majority of InfoPath users don't know what it does. So I would classify this as a technical formula on account of the use of eval().

 I'm not sure if it relates to the work you're doing, but we do have a large number of blogs and webinar videos detailing various techniques and I recommend checking them out. And of course, we're always here on the forums to help you with any tricky formulas.