Cannot (Easily) Add Multiple Phone Contacts in 1.9

Submitted by mckelvey on Thu, 29/12/2016 - 01:58

General developer's discussion

Greetings All,

Have just pushed 1.9 up to the production servers and for the most part, it seems to be going well. Have received a note from the receptionist, however, regarding a behavior change when adding new clients. Seems that in 1.8, one could continue to add additional phone numbers by using the ADD button, but in 1.9, it seems that one must save with OK after each, then get back in through EDIT to add an additional number. Not a show-stopper by any means, but more awkward than in the past.

Is there a tweak I can make to restore the previous behavior?

Thanks,

Sam Longiaru

Re: Cannot (Easily) Add Multiple Phone Contacts in 1.9

Submitted by tgething (not verified) on Thu, 29/12/2016 - 07:14.

Sam - I just has a play.

My recipe is:

use Customer|New to enter name etc
click Contacts tab
click the (by default created) phone contact to select it and enter the number
use the pull down to select Phone Contact (if you have not already done so)
click Add to add a new phone number and enter its details
repeat 5 as many time as needed
click the (by default created) email contact to select it and enter the details
use the pull down to select Email Contact (if you have not already done so)
click Add to add a new email contact and enter its details
repeat 9 as many time as needed
click the (by default created) location contact to select it and enter the details
use the pull down to select Location Contact (if you have not already done so)
click Add to add a new locationcontact and enter its details
repeat 13 as many time as needed
FINALLY press OK

The above works because the Add button does 'take the stuff I just entered and do an Apply and then add a new empty contact of the specified type'.

BOTTOM LINE: - I cannot duplicate your problem.

Regards, Tim G

Re: Cannot (Easily) Add Multiple Phone Contacts in 1.9

Submitted by mckelvey on Thu, 29/12/2016 - 09:47.

Hi Tim,

Thanks for taking a look. After digging into this more, I see that there is no real behavioral difference between our 1.8 and 1.9. I don't use very much (and so am not real familiar) with the front end of OVPMS, but our 1.9 works as you describe... and seems to be the same as our 1.8. Not sure what was being observed as anything different. I'll try to get some more information... otherwise assume that there is no issue here.

Thanks. The fact that you could not duplicate it was most important!

Sam

Re: Cannot (Easily) Add Multiple Phone Contacts in 1.9

Submitted by mckelvey on Tue, 17/01/2017 - 09:25.

Greetings All,

I'm reviving this thread as I happened to be at the clinic today when the receptionist encountered this odd behavior in 1.9 and demonstrated it to me. I'm a believer!

She had been adding a new client and had put in the client's location, email and phone contact using the default entries. She had designated the phone contact as mobile and preferred. After Applying, she attempted to Add a new phone contact (Phone Contact was displayed in the pull-down) and was taken to the already-entered phone-contact for editing only. No new phone contact window was generated. She called me over at that point and we tested OVPMS for a while. It was not possible to add any new additional locations, emails or phone contacts at that point. Any attempt to add a new contact, only bounced us to the appropriate contact where only the old data could be edited. Only after pressing OK, and Edit, was a new contact able to be Added.

As I mentioned above, she had encountered this behavior before and recognized that it is different to the 1.8 behavior she had become used to. My brief testing of 1.9 around this issue at that time and comparison to 1.8 suggested that the standard procedure outlined by Tim G, above, was working as it should in both versions. But from what I saw today, it suggests that there is some minor issue (inconsistently triggered (?)... grrr) when entering new data that prevents the Add function from executing as it should.

I'll ask her to keep a watch for it and see if she can detect any differences in her procedure that triggers the behavior. In addition, I'll play in my demo version to see if I can find a repeatable condition where the Add feature fails.

Thanks,

Sam

Edit...

I think that she had used the Apply only because Adding did not bring up another Phone Contact window so thought that might get things unstuck. Using the Apply had no effect on the behavior. I see that one should not really need to Apply, but merely Add when entering new information. Along with a final OK.

Re: Cannot (Easily) Add Multiple Phone Contacts in 1.9

Submitted by mckelvey on Sat, 21/01/2017 - 02:33.

OK... so we found the issue. I stood over the shoulder of the receptionist as she entered a new record and noticed that she was pressing Apply after each entry. Seems that if you enter a new contact, hit Apply, then Add, you are left with only editing an existing entry. Haven't checked as to whether this is different behavior to 1.8 (she says she always did it that way with no issue), but at least we have the source of the problem. She is now doing the procedure strictly as outlined by Tim G. above... although hitting Add is not really Applying in the same sense as the Apply button is.

Thanks,

Sam