Beginner gINT Tips


The following helpful tips for Beginner gINT users have been previously published via e-mail to "gINT News" subscribers prior to November 2009. 

Use Sort Command to Find Empty Fields in Input

The Sort on current column command is found under the Edit menu. The short cut is Ctrl+Alt+S or clicking the column header with the left mouse button. The sort is temporary, that is, on saving and returning, the records are again sorted by the key field (Depth, Date/Time, or Reading). Once sorted you can use this command to help find empty fields, help find records in grids with many records, and to help discern patterns in the data. If the column has already been sorted in ascending order invoking the Sort on current command a second time sorts the column in descending order.

Note: the Sort on current column command also works with Library Data and Lookup Lists.

 

Use Fixed Font For Data Input

This property affects only the font used during the data input process and has nothing to do with output. Situations exist where data needs to be printed as tables in a remarks column on a log, for example. gINT does not have a tab facility so the remarks column can be printed in a fixed font (usually Courier New). To allow the user to line up the columns during data input a fixed font is also needed.

Changing Table Display Order for Data Input

You can use either the Tables:List menu in Data Input or the Tables:Input Sequence … for Input menu in Data Design. This allows you to change the table display order seen at input time. Note that the Project and Point tables cannot be moved. This feature does not change the order in the drop-down list of the tables in Project Database or the drop-down list of tables in the Data Tool. These lists are still in alphabetical order.

Main Page Drop Down Combo Box Keystroke Navigation

When focus is in the Combo Box the Arrow keys will navigate through the list without immediately changing the current page. Up, Down, PageUp, PageDown, Ctrl+Home and Ctrl+End comply with this operation.

NOTE: After navigation to another row in the list, Esc will cause the Combo Box to close without changing the current selection.

 

Grid-type screens:
The same behavior applies to Drop-down selection lists in Grid screens, except Ctrl+Home and Ctrl+End move you between the first and last fields in the current row.

 

Dialog Boxes/Input

1. Required fields are shown with a yellow background color.

2. If there is a required field on a tab, the tab color is shown as yellow.

3. The expression properties (e.g., Depth Expression) of entity and report dialogs are 2 line, multiple line text boxes. They allow up to 64,000 characters and have the zoom option available to all multiline text boxes for easier editing.

Note that these expression properties do not allow paragraphs but will accept line continuations, e.g., this is not allowed:

 

<<Calc(0.3048 * (<<SAMPLE.Depth>> + <<Val(<<SAMPLE.Length>>)>> / 2) )>>

but this is:

<<Calc(0.3048 * (<<SAMPLE.Depth>> + _ <<Val(<<SAMPLE.Length>>)>> / 2)_ )>>

If you type the former, the program will strip the embedded carriage return/line feed characters and create one long line.

Collating Reports

Question:
"The trouble I'm having is that when I print multiple copies of a set of logs, the output is not collated even though the checkbox is selected. The only way to avoid having to collate the logs manually is to print one set at a time. With multiple copies of large sets of logs this can be quite cumbersome."

Answer:
In the print dialog there is a "Print Management" frame with two options. The default is to print each log as it is completed. The collation occurs on the printed pages, so this first option is not what you want. Mark the second option (print all data sets when job is complete). The program will build a temporary file with all pages of all boreholes and then print them all at once. The collation will then work as you require.

CTRL+A

You can highlight all rows in an Input grid with the short cut Ctrl+A. This is the same as selecting the Edit:Select All menu item.

"Find" tab in Help file

When doing a search in Help, you will notice a "Find" tab at the top of the dialog. If you are not using this, do so. This creates an index of words and phrases and can be used as an alternative search engine. Note that you must rebuild the find index every time you update the Help file from our web page.

Short Cut Keys

In the Help file, click on the Index tab in the upper left corner and type "Short Cut Keys" for a listing of all short cuts key strokes in gINT.

CTRL+TAB

This short cut keystroke moves between the two grids, such as in Lab Testing tables.

CTRL+SHIFT+Q

This is the short cut keystroke for Quick Zoom. It is available in ALL gIDraw applications.

Text Macros

You can store and retrieve commonly used data in Input through the use of Text Macros. Search Help for "Text Macro" for details.