ABCD Features In Development
By Richard Rost
This is where I'm going to keep my notes for what coming up next in the ABCD development queue.
Speak Up!
If there is something you really want to see added to the database, let me know. Speak up. Make your voice heard! Post a comment below or contact me. I'm building this in the order of highest demand. So if many people want to see, for example, printing invoices, then that will get worked on first.
Bug Fixes, Add-Ons
- ZIP Code lookup
- Mark people active / inactive so they don't show up in lists. Prefered over deleting people
- Allow people to be deleted, but need event to delete related records - not using cascade deletes
- Online Links (like email, address, phone) for FB, twitter, web site, IG, etc. Opens to correct service w hyperlink
- Jump OnDblClick from MiscTypeF to Helper
- System values FORM and a way to select a folder for the ABCDFolder variable
Still Needed in Core
- Contact Management
- Basic Order Entry
- Basic Task Manager
- Splitting the Database
- Security
Enhanced Address & Phone Module
- List of countries to select from (helper data). Priority order for commonly used. (US, Can, UK, Aus, etc.)
- Country table isn't exhaustive. You can add new ones as needed easily
- Set a default country just like the primary setting for email, phone, etc. above.
- Assume new customers are from your default country
- Country changes labels for other fields (Canada changes State to Province)
- Country can change rules for entering ZIP codes (Canada 6 for example) or list of states
- ZIP code lookup - populates state, city, county - add new ones if don't exist - show form if multiple
- Phone number input masks by country
- Like with the Relationships above, may be able to store State>Country>ZIP code information in the Helper Table. A 2nd ID field would create that relationship. Experiment with this.
- Copy address from another entity
- Potential: store city, state, zip in local database but if it doesn't exist, ask the user to query the web to find it. Need to find a free API to get data from. If not, enter it.
- A multi-select option for Misc Data. For example, someone wants to collect demographic information like ethnicity. The user can select multiple options for this. Have the misc-data field say "Multiple Items Selected" and then double-click to open up a popup form with a multi-select list box.
- Select from related entity address list to prevent duplicate entries
Contact Management
- I was originally going to make contacts a separate module because I figured not everyone might want it, but then I said to myself, the name of the product is the "Access Business & Contact Database" so that would be silly. Basic contact manegement is going to be included in the Core.
- Contacts assigned to multiple entities (group meeting, for example) to make it easy to jump between participant records
- Show on the subform for the entityT / contacts tab, show date, brief description, notes, another subform with the OTHER participants that can be tagged in this contact "meeting"
System Options
- which tab is the default start tab on entity form
- do you want entity form wide or narrow
- colors
Misc Data Sets
- You can also collect these fields into data Sets: MiscDataSetT and DetailT will hold a collection of fields that YOU may want to ask for your business. For example, you could have a "default" set that includes fields that aren't part of the ABCD core, but you ALWAYS ask. If you sell insurance you may always ask: marital status, dependents, do you smoke, height, weight, etc. Pick it, click a button, and all of these questions are added to your MiscT for that entity
- you can also use these sets to create questionnaires. One click on the SET and the questions are automatically populated into the subform for the entity. then you can fill out the data
- Add capability to search through MiscData in the EntityList
Entity Search Form Enhancements
- For dates show MM DD YYYY boxes because you may want a list of people all born in 1950, or all in October
- Export results of search to text, excel, etc.
- Printable report based on search results
- Populate SearchText box with top 10 most popular items from the database, such as states, countries, etc. However this could slow down the database over a network.
- MiscData searches for dates and numbers need to obey same rules for entities
- Option on MiscDataType table to "show in search form" because some things like credit card number you don't want there. Yes/No/AdminOnly options.
- While we're at it, you may only want some of the Misc data being visible to Admin only, like credit card number. Users can ENTER them, but cannot VIEW existing data.
Other Modules in Development
This list represents modules that are currently in development. There are two ways that a module gets "fast tracked." Either a large number of people have requested it, or a client has paid a priority fee to have this module developed. In either case, these are currently in development and will be finished first, after the Core enhancements listed above:
- Letter Writer - printed correspondence, mail merge, mailing labels, send to group or by other criteria (state, etc.)
- Bulk Email Sending
- Tasks - priority TO DO list with date due, auto generate at regular intervals
- Tracking Insurance Policies
- Accounts Payable
- Budgeting
- Importing Leads - track lead source (vendor, ad, etc.)
- Heirarchal Notepad (items, sub-items, etc.) like my web notes
If you have a need for a database project for your business, contact me. If I think it will be a good fit for an ABCD module, I'll add it to the list. If it's not already on the fast track, you can pay to have it put on this list so it's developed first.
School Enrollment & Attendance
- Groups will be used to track enrollment in classes
- Upgrade Groups so that a group can have subgroups (self-joins) this way you can have departments (science, english, etc.) and each group can have subgroups (sc101, sc102, etc.)
- Track daily attendence
- Scheduling, both of regular class schedules (mon, wed, fri from 8 to 11 am) and for individual seminars (date/time)
- Tuition tracking
Integrate the Check Register as a Module
Payees will be Entities in a special PAYEE system category. make a PayeeF form that shows the category and lets you add people to a listbox/subform on that form. payment categories will be a special system category type
Other Modules
This list is in no particular order. Speak up if you want to see me work on something sooner rather than later.
- Order Entry, Quotes, Invoices - similar to what is covered in my normal classes, but polished and professional
- Recurring Memberships
- Sales reports, forecasting
- Product Database unit cost, sale price, import products from vendors
- Vendors - many-to-many with products (products can be purchased from multiple vendors)
- Inventory management, stock levels, reorder
- Barcoding - UPC, ISBN, create your own
- Checking account register
- Import transaction data from bank, paypal
- Employee time tracking
- Employee scheduling
- Images? Anyone interested in displaying pictures of their customers???
- Surveys (misc data sets) send out by email and track responses
- Church management
Other Features
These are features that will be built into the database eventually.
- Keywords - type in keywords in a text box for any entity. The system will analyze them and if they exist in your keyword database, will automatically add them to that user. If they're new, they will get added to the database.
- Split database with instructions on how to set up on a LAN and integrate with AccessUpdater
- Remote data viewing / editing with disconnected mini DB
- Full security lockdown (everything covered in Security Seminar)
- Full external strings manager (so you can call Entity "customer" if you want, and other fields)
- User preferences (colors, fonts, for forms, reports, etc.)
- Upscale to SQL Server, local network
- Upscale to SQL Server, online
- Upscale to SQL Server as a service (I host and maintain your data)
- Web-based data viewing editing (for web-hosted data)
- Full training videos for USERS so that you don't have to explain to non-Access people how to use your database. These videos will be presented in a non-technical way how to USE the database. Save time on training your secretary.
Possible Add-Ons
Suggestions, Comments, Questions?
Again, let me know if you have any thoughts, ideas, or features you'd like to see in this database. Post them below!
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