List View form
Completing the Content tab

Field

Description

Each row of this array identifies a selection criterion. The order of rows in this array is not significant. PRPC converts information in this array to an SQL WHERE clause.

In the Field field, you can specify only Single Value properties that correspond to exposed columns in a database table here, not properties within the Storage Stream (BLOB) column. The selection criteria can, however, depend on properties that are not Single Value mode, on properties that do not correspond to exposed columns, or on more sophisticated comparisons than provided by this tab. You can either:

• Complete fields on the Organize tab to supplement SQL operations defined on this tab, or
• Expose properties as columns before referencing them here.

As a best practice for performance, using exposed properties as criteria on this tab is preferred over selection with fields on the Organize tab. See PDN article23116 How to detect and remedy the performance impact of Obj-List methods and list view reports.

Optional. If you enter multiple criteria, enter a letter or letters that uniquely identifies each row, to identify this row in the Logic field.

For example, enter A for the first row, B for the second row, and so on. The Logic value must mention each label.

Enter a property reference for a comparison. For exposed properties defined in the class corresponding to the Applies To key part of this list view rule, start the property reference with a period. You can also identify fully qualified values on other clipboard pages that are always present on the clipboard, such as the requestor page or process page.

If the Type of this property is TextEncrypted, special instructions apply to the Condition, Value, and Edit Input fields. See Property rules — Implementing and using the TextEncrypted Type.

If you enter .pxObjClass here and the Applies To key part of this list view rule is a framework class, at runtime the report execution can use the corresponding implementation class, not the framework class, for comparisons and report content. This feature eliminates the need to copy each framework class-based list view report into the implementation class. To enable this capability, select the Report on Descendant Class Instances checkbox on this tab.

Optional. Enter text to name this row of the array. If you do not specify a caption, the Field name will be used.

Select a comparison condition, such as Is Equal or Starts With.

PRPC converts the Starts With, Ends With, and Contains comparison conditions to the standard SQL "LIKE" clause. Vendor-specific non-standard optimizations such as the Oracle CONTAINS feature are not used. If your application contains a list view report that requires such comparisons for tables with a very large number of rows, you can create a custom getContent activity that implements optimized SQL for retrieval.

Enter a comparison value, one of the following:

• A literal constant, formatted in accordance with the property type. See Constants in expressions. To compare the value with multiple literal constants, surround each with double quote characters and separate them with commas. (Place a backslash character \ before any double quote character that appears within the constant.) As described below, you can click the magnifying glass icon () in some situations to review current clipboard values for the property identified in the Field field.
• A fully qualified property reference to a Single Value property that is present on the clipboard at runtime. The Type of this property must match the Type of the property in the Field field.
• A fully qualified property reference to a Value List or Value Group property present on the clipboard at runtime. The Type of this property must match the Type of the property in the Field field. To compare the value with multiple Value List or Value Group properties, separate the names with a comma.
• The keyword param followed by a period, followed by a parameter that is defined on the parameter page of the calling activity.
• A period followed by the name of a Single Value property that is exposed as a column. This allows selection based on comparing the values of two properties in the same instance (the same database row), if the types of the properties are identical or comparable.
• A symbolic date, for a Date or DateTime value. When the list value rule executes, this symbolic reference is converted to an actual date or date range based on the time zone of the user and the Condition value. For example, if the user selects Last Year and the Condition value is IS EQUAL TO, the result is a date range between January 1 and December 31 inclusive, of the previous calendar year.

If the Condition field is set to IS NULL or IS NOT NULL, leave this field blank.

Commas correspond to an OR test: if the Value field contains two or more entries separated by commas, the comparison is true at runtime if the value of the Field field equals (or is greater than, or is contained in, and so on) any one of the entries.

Similarly, when the Value field contains a Value List or Value Group property reference, the comparison is true at runtime if the value of the Field field is true for any element in the list or group.

When evaluating either of the two Condition values Greater or Greater or Equal at runtime, the result is the same as applying the test to the largest value in a list or group. Similarly, when evaluating the Condition values Less or Less or Equal at runtime, the result is the same as applying the test to the smallest value in the group or list. The Value List and Value Group options are most useful for other condition values, such as Contains or Starts with.

Using the Pick Values pop-up window

For guided assistance in completing this field, click the magnifying glass icon (). A pop-up window appears with one or more of these tabs:

• Available Values — The system searches the column in the database corresponding to the property in the Field field to collect and display up to 1,000 values for the Field property in a new window. To add literal values to the Value field, check one or more boxes and click  Apply . (You can also type literal constants directly, whether or not they appear on this list.) This tab appears at runtime only to users who hold the standard privilege @baseclass.ShowStoredValues. For such users, it is visible at runtime when the Display Available Values? box in the Prompt Settings area is selected.
• Valid Values — The system presents values from the Table fields on the General tab of the property referenced in the Field field. To add literal values to the Value field, check one or more boxes and click  Apply  . This tab appears at runtime when the Display Valid Values? box in the Prompt Settings area is selected.
• Compatible Columns — The system lists exposed properties with the same Type as the property in the Field field, as candidates for this field. This tab appears at runtime when the Display Compatible Columns? box in the Prompt Settings area is selected.
• Time Periods — For a property of type Date or DateTime, allows the selection of a symbolic date such as Yesterday or Current Year.

Enter a comparison value to be used when you do not specify a value in the Value field.

Optional. Identify an edit input rule to convert the value from the format supplied by the Value field to another format. (If you identify a custom activity in the Activity Name field, the activity must access and apply these rules to input values.)

Select to cause runtime tests or comparisons of the Field value and the Value value to occur after the system converts both to uppercase. If selected, then at runtime "a" matches "A" and is less than "B".

Clear to cause tests of the Field value and the Value value to occur without case conversion. In this case, "a" is greater than "A" and also greater than "B"

In most cases, leave this box cleared. Select this box only when truly necessary to obtain the rows of the report:

• If your PegaRULES database is hosted by Microsoft SQL Server, comparisons are always case-insensitive, so selecting this box does not affect the report contents, but may add processing.
• If your PegaRULES database is hosted by Oracle, IBM UDB or most other database vendor products, selecting this box may affect which rows appear in the report when values occur in mixed case. However, conversion to uppercase can significantly slow database processing.
• Case conversion is meaningful only for properties of type Text, Identifier or Password. Regardless of database software, case conversion is not needed for numbers, dates, or text that contains only uppercase or only lowercase characters.

See PDN article 25511 How to correct the Case Insensitive warning for list view rules.

This box is meaningful only when the entry in the Value field is not a constant. By default, if the value for the Value field is null at runtime, the system ignores the criterion defined by this row; processing is the same as if this criterion row is not present.

For example, assume the criteria in a row is:

If this list view rule executes at a time when Param.Letter has the value "C", this criterion limits the report to contain only instances in which the Lastname property value starts with the letter C. However, if the same rule executes again when the Param.Letter parameter has no value, this criterion is dropped, so instances with any Lastname value (or none) are selected.

In situations where this default behavior is not desirable, select the Use Null* box to force the Condition value to become Is Null when the Value value is blank at runtime. In the above example, the criterion is transformed to "Lastname is null" — quite different from having no restriction on Lastname.

If this list view rule is executed on a web node as part of a Pega composite application, the Use Null* setting is selected for all criteria.

Optional. Using the labels entered in the Criteria array, enter a logical expression that defines how the system combines the criteria into an overall Boolean value at runtime. The expression can include parentheses and the operators AND and OR.

For example, if the table contains four rows labeled A, B, C, and D, you can enter:

(A OR B OR C) AND D

in this field. This notation is the same as for the logic statement in when condition rules.

If you leave the Logic field blank, the system selects only instances for which all criteria rows are true.

Select to cause runtime conversion of user-supplied values for parameters from a locale-specific format to the internal representation. When selected, the system attempts to convert literal values or parameter value for numbers (Integer, Double, or Decimal), DateTime, and Date, specified in the Criteria section or trend section from a locale-specific format.

If not selected, users must enter parameter values and literal values for DateTime parameters in the form MM/DD/YY HH:MM AAA.

When selected, the system converts user inputs from the locale-specific format occurs before the activity specified in the Activity Name field runs. The system applies any edit input rules specified in the Criteria array after the conversion but before the activity runs.

For example, if the user's locale is FR (France), an input of 3,142 for a Decimal criterion corresponds to the input 3.142 from a user with a United States locale. Similarly, a user in France can input of 4/7/6 for July 4, 2006. A United States user enters this date as 7/4/6. The French-locale user can enter 1.000.000 for an Integer value of one million.

Field

Description

Select whether to use the default prompt settings or define custom settings.

When you select Custom, the form changes. Identify on the Pages & Classes tab the class and page name of a page that can hold prompt values. Create and reference a section rule in that class to collect each prompt value. Use the standard control Reporting_SymbolicDates if you want to allow the user to select a symbolic date for a Date or DateTime property. You can also identify a section to hold report output and criteria values.

This label corresponds to the label defined in the criteria row.

This field is corresponds to the field specified in the criteria row.

Select a value to determine how a user of this report can modify the criterion in this row, when prompted before report execution:

• No Access — No part of this row is visible.
• Read Only — The criterion row is visible but users cannot alter the criteria.
• All Access — The criterion appears. Users can change the Field, Condition, and Value fields.
• Value Only — The criterion appears. Users can change the Value field. (This is the default Prompt Mode value.)

Select to cause the system to display the criteria to users who request this report, before the system executes the list view report.

When selected, at least one Criteria row must allow user input; the Prompt Mode for at least one row must not be No Access or Read Only.

Select to cause the criteria (both prompts and values) used to appear as part of the report output.

As a best practice to avoid confusion or error, select this option if the report user is allowed to change report selection criteria. If not selected, the output for a single report may vary from user to user for no easily detected reason — because the users have different saved criteria.

Select to display at runtime a list of up to 1,000 values for a property referenced in the Field field. The system searches saved instances of the class until it finds 1,000 distinct values.

User selections apply to the Value field for the current execution of the report. This checkbox is meaningful only when Prompt user? is selected and one or more rows of the criteria allow users to enter values.

Select to make available to users at runtime a list of values based on the Table fields on the General tab of the property referenced in the Field field.

The user's selections apply to the Value field for the current execution of the report. This checkbox is meaningful only when Prompt user? is selected and one or more rows of the criteria allow users to enter values.

Select to make available to users at runtime a list of properties eligible for comparison. These are properties in the Applies To class (or an ancestor class) that are exposed as columns and match the Type of the property referenced in the Field field.

The user's selection at runtime applies to the Value field, for the current execution of the report. This checkbox is meaningful only when Prompt user? is selected and one or more rows of the criteria allow users to enter property names.

Enter a text string to display on the search button.

Field

Description

Enter a property reference in the class corresponding to the Applies To key part, or in an ancestor superclass. Start the property reference with a period.

You can specify any property in the class, including aggregate properties. However, performance is better when the properties that appear here correspond to exposed columns in the PegaRULES database table.

Select Ascending, Descending, or No Sorting to control whether and how this property affects sorting the rows of the report.

Sorting specified in this field occurs within database software and uses sort algorithms provided by the database software vendors. In unusual cases, the sort sequence may not match your needs. Additional sorting can occur later on the PRPC server, as specified in the Organize tab.

Select to eliminate duplicate records in the view.

Select to have the report display the key field for each row.

Field

Description

For an internal class, enter pzInsKey with no leading period. For an external class, enter the name of the property that uniquely identifies a row, with no leading period.

For an example, see the standard list view rule Log-License-Usage-Daily.List.ALL, which identifies rows by the pzUsageDay property, a timestamp.

Field

Description

Enter a clipboard page name to contain the report contents. (You can't use pxResults as the name of this page.)

In most cases, accept the default getContent activity. Identify an activity that applies to the Embed-ListParams class to support processing of results from the database operation.

When reporting on rules, you can select getContentForProfile to limit rules to those that are accessible on the report requestor's RuleSet list.

When reporting on full-text search results, use getLuceneContent. See Understanding the full-text search facility.

If you implement a custom activity for unusual reporting needs, choose a name other than getContent, and identify the activity in this field. Your activity can derive report contents from various means and sources, such as access to external databases through connector rules and calculations, but must place the results on the page named in the Content Page Name field and enforce the Maximum Value limit.

The standard activity getLookUpList, referenced in list view rules that support the Class Explorer and similar Designer Studio tools, performs specialized processing that bypasses or ignores many fields on the List View form. In most situations, if you copy a list view rule that calls getLookupList, results will be more predictable if you change the ActivityName to getContent in your list view rule.

A few list view capabilities are disabled when an activity other than getContent is used here.

GetContent activities and external classes

Additional considerations apply when an activity identified here accesses instances of an external class:

1. Design the activity to use an SQL alias named pxInsHandle for the key of the external table. For example:

SELECT CUSTOMERID as "pxInsHandle"

2. Use only columns of the external table that conform to PRPC data type conventions, as follows:

Optional. Enter a maximum number of instances to retrieve for the report contents. As a best practice during testing, accept the default value 500. If you leave this blank, the system enforces a limit of 10,000.

This field is disabled — and the value is ignored — when the Enable Paging? field on the Organize tab is selected.

You can set another default value for this field, both for the rule form, and for the Report Wizard. Override the default Rule-Obj-ListView.pyDefault data transform and set the initial value of property pyContentSource.pyMax to the desired limit.

Select to include a message at the top of the output display if not all rows that meet the selection criteria are included in the report output. The message is:

Found more than the maximum number of records (nnn)

where nnn is the Maximum Value limit. If all records are displayed, a record count appears.

Displaying nnnn records

Clear to disable this message. This option is enabled by default for new reports you create and disabled for reports created in versions prior to V5.5.

Select in most cases to mark the Code-Pega-List page returned by this list view at runtime as "read-only", meaning that later processing can modify the retrieved data only in specific ways. When selected, internal processing reuses certain clipboard pages, reducing database access and improving performance. (Technically, the Code-Pega-List structure is a type known as a virtual list.)

Clear this box if the Edit In Excel option (on the Organize tab) is checked, or if your application requires processing of the embedded pages.

If this list view uses the facilities of the Join tab, this box must be checked.

Certain post-processing can occur despite the selection of the Read Only checkbox. Declare Expression calculations are an exception; backwards chaining computations can occur even when the Read Only checkbox is checked. See More about List View rules.

When the results page is marked as read-only, later processing can delete embedded pages (for example, with the Page-Remove or Obj-Filter method) and can update property values on the embedded pages. But postprocessing cannot add embedded pages or add properties. Any attempt to add to the embedded pages produces an exception, such as:

SQLError - There was a problem getting a list — Illegal 0 length operation

Cannot update — page is read-only

Select to indicate that list view processing is to use the database identified in the Reports Database field of the Data-Admin-DB-Table instance that supports the Applies To class of this list view. See How to use a reports database.

Chose this option only if the Reports Database field is not blank and identifies a database table that is replicated from the production PegaRULES database. If the report uses JOIN operations that draw from multiple database tables, all tables must be in the same reports database.

When this option is selected, at runtime the report uses data from the alternate database. It sets property pyUseAlternateDb to true on the top-level output Code-Pega-List page.

Select to cause this report, at runtime, to use an implementation class derived from the current rule's Applies To class as the source of report contents.

Select this to allow one list view rule, saved in a framework class, to execute against the work items in an implementation class. This capability reduces the number of rules needed when building an implementation of a framework.

This checkbox is effective only if the Applies To class of this list view rule is derived from the Work- base class.

To determine the Work- class actually used in report execution, use the Tracer tool, or, from the list view display, right-click and select View Source from the browser menu; search for ViewClass.

Field

Description

Optional. Identify a work type within the class group. The list view output may include properties from this class (work type) when they exist. For example, if the class group has three work types, you can report on properties defined in the first type even though these properties do not exist for the other two types.

If this work type is derived from Work-, choose carefully whether you want to join to an implementation class, or in a framework class. At runtime, list view rules with a framework class in this field can report on work items in the associated implementation class, if the Report on Descendant Class Instances option is selected.

Optional. Select the Privilege Name key part of a privilege rule.

The system uses the Class and Privilege values with class inheritance to look for the privilege rule.

Optional. Select to allow this list view rule to be executed on a web node, as part of a Pega composite application. If selected, users of a Pega composite application can display this report, if the normal access roles, RuleSet list, and privileges requirements are met.

If not checked and a user at a web node attempts to execute this list view rule, the rule does not run and a security exception is added to the Alert log.

For security reasons, list view rules to be executed on a web node as part of a Pega composite application cannot use parameters.

When this list view rule is executed on a web node as part of a Pega composite application, the Use Null* setting is selected for all criteria.