I'm developing a kind of lost-and-found website. So, when a person has lost or found something, s(he) will post a report about this.
How to properly mark up a report about lost/found item, using the Schema.org vocabulary?
I need to explicitly tell that a publication in question is a report. What typeof (RDFa)/itemtype (Microdata) are relevant to this kind of post?
Report contains information about:
Items, that can be things, pets or people;
Contacts of a person, that is an author of a report in question;
Rewards, required to get found item back;
Address of an item;
Date and time of losing of finding was happen (do not confuse with publication date on server;
Publication date and time on server.
What attributes should be used to describe such pieces of data?
Related
I have added posts to firebase and I am wondering how I can pull the posts chronologically based on when the user has posted them.
My Database is set up like below
The first node after comments is the User ID and then the posts are underneath that. Obviously, these posts are in order, however if a new user posts something in between "posting" and "another 1" ,for example, how would I pull that so it shows up in between.
Is there a way to remove the autoID and just use the userID as a key? The problem I am running into is the previous post is overwritten then.
I am accepting the answer as it is the most thorough. What I did to solve my problem was just create the unique key as the first node and then use the UID as a child and the comment as a child. Then I pull the unique key's as they are in order and find the comment associated with the uid.
The other answers all have merit but a more complete solution includes timestamping the post and denormalizing your data so it can be queried (assuming it would be queried at some point). In Firebase, flatter is better.
posts
post_0
title: "Posts And Posting"
msg: "I think there should be more posts about posting"
by_uid: "uid_0"
timestamp: "20171030105500"
inv_timestamp: "-20171030105500"
uid_time: "uid_0_ 20171030105500"
uid_inv_time: "uid_0_-20171030105500"
comments:
comment_0
for_post: "post_0"
text: "Yeah, posts about posting are informative"
by_uid: "uid_1"
timestamp: "20171030105700"
inv_timestamp: "-20171030105700"
uid_time: "uid_1_20171030105700"
uid_inv_time: "uid_1_-20171030105700"
comment_1
for_post: "post_0"
text: "Noooo mooooore posts, please"
by_uid: "uid_2"
timestamp: "20171030110300"
inv_timestamp: "-20171030110300"
uid_time: "uid_2_20171030110300"
uid_inv_time: "uid_2_-20171030110300"
With this structure we can
get posts and their comments and order them ascending or descending
query for all posts within the last week
all comments or posts made by a user
all comments or posts made by a user within a date range (tricky, huh)
I threw a couple of other key: value pairs in there to round it out a bit: compound values, query-ing ascending and descending, timestamp.
You can not use the userID as key value instead of the autoID, because the key must be unique, thats why Firebase just updates the value and does not add another one with the same key. Normally Firebase nodes are ordered chronologically by default, so if you pull the values, those should be in the right order. However if you wanna make sure about that, you can add a timestamp value and set a server timestamp. After pulling the data you can order it by that timestamp (I think there is actually a timestamp saved automatically by firebase that you can access somehow, but you need to look that up in the documentation). If I got it right, in order to accomplish what you want, you need to change the structure of your database. For example you could maybe use the autoID but save the userID you wanted to use as key as a value if you need that. Hope I got your idea right, if not just be more precise and I will try to help.
Firebase keys are chronological by default - it's built into their key generation algorithm. I think you need to restructure/rethink your data.
Your POSTS database should (possibly) have the comments listed with each post, and then you can duplicate on the user record if needed for faster retrieval if they need to be accessed by user. So something like:
POSTS
- post (unique key)
- title (text)
- date (timestamp)
- comments
- comment (unique key)
- text (text)
- user_id (user key)
- date (timestamp)
When you pull the comments, you shouldn't be pulling them from a bunch of different users. That could result it a lot of queries and a ton of load time. Instead, the comments could be added (chronologically of course) to the post object itself, and also to the user if you want to keep a reference there. Unlike in MySQL, NoSQL databases can have quite a bit of this data duplication.
I'm designing a REST API where you can search for data in different countries, but since you can search for the same thing, at the same time, in different countries (max 4), am I unsure of the best/correct way to do it.
This would work to start with to get data (I'm using cars as an example):
/api/uk,us,nl/car/123
That request could return different ids for the different countries (uk=1,us=2,nl=3), so what do I do when data is requested for those 3 countries?
For a nice structure I could get the data one at the time:
/api/uk/car/1
/api/us/car/2
/api/nl/car/3
But that is not very efficient since it hits the backend 3 times.
I could do this:
/api/car/?uk=1&us=2&nl=3
But that doesn't work very well if I want to add to that path:
/api/uk/car/1/owner
Because that would then turn into:
/api/car/owner/?uk=1&us=2&nl=3
Which doesn't look good.
Anyone got suggestions on how to structure this in a good way?
I answered a similar question before, so I will stick to that idea:
You have a set of elements -cars- and you want to filter it in some way. My advice is add any filter as a field. If the field is not present, then choose one country based on the locale of the client:
mydomain.com/api/v1/car?countries=uk,us,nl
This field should dissapear when you look for a specific car or its owner
mydomain.com/api/v1/car/1/owner
because the country is not needed (unless the car ID 1 is reused for each country)
Update:
I really did not expect the id of the car can be shared by several cars, an ID should be unique (like a primary key in a database). Then, it makes sense to keep the country parameter with the owner's search:
mydomain.com/api/v1/car/1/owner?countries=uk,us
This should return a list of people who own a car with the id 1... but for me this makes little sense as a functionality, in this search I'll only allow one country:
mydomain.com/api/v1/car/1/owner?country=uk
I have a specific question regarding the utilization of three tables in a database. Table 1 is called Personnel, and lists the names of the staff.
Tables 2 and 3 are identical, just listing two different types of overtime (long and short), along with the hours of the OT, Date of the OT, and Assigned to/Picked fields that are empty.
Here is the idea, I just dont know how to implement it. I would like to create a form for people to enter their OT picks, then automatically move to the next person on the list. So Rich Riphon, as an example, would be up first, would click on the link I would send, and a form would open up, showing his name, populated by the first table, and showing two drop down menus, populated from the Long OT and Short OT tables. He would select one from each (or None, which would be a option) and Submit it.
The form action would be to place his name in the Assigned field for the OT he picked, and place a Yes in the Picked field.
When the next person in the list opens the form, it has moved down to number 2 on the Personnel list, Cheryl Peterson, and shows her the remaining OT selections (excluding those that have a Yes in the Picked column).
Any suggestions or comments or better ways to do this would be appreciated.
First, I don't think ms access would be able to (easily) kick off the process based on a hyperlink. You may be able to do something by passing a macro name to a cmd prompt but it would take some mastery to get it working properly. Could you instead create a login form to get the current user? If you do that you don't really need to display the personnel list, just keep track of who has not yet responded to the OT request. Essentially at that point all you would need on your form is a listing of the available OT and a button that creates the assignment. Also it may be easier (and a better design) to only have one table for the OT listings and add a column for the type of overtime (long/short).
What if Cheryl isn't the 2nd person to get the form? Your concept goes out the window.
Instead, I would keep a table of all user names, and their security level. managers can see everything, individual users can only see their record. This would be done by using a query behind the OT Picks form, and either filtering by the current user or not filtering at all. I have done many of these types of "user control" databases and they all have worked well.
As for the actual OT tracking, I agree with Steve's post in that it should be done in one table This would be the preferred method of a concept referred to as "normalizing data". You really want to store as little data as possible to keep the size of your database down. As an example, your Login table would have the following fields:
UserID
FirstName
LastName
SecurityLevel
Address1
Address2
City
State
Phone
Etc... (whatever relevant info pertains to that person)
Your OT table would look like this:
UserID
OTDate
OTHours
OTType
Etc... (whatever else is relevant to OT)
You would then join those 2 tables on the UserID fields in both tables any time you needed to write a query to report OT hours or whatever.
I am relatively new to Filemaker programming, but I have come across what I thought was a bug, which I have been tearing my hair out trying to squash, only to find it is more a "feature" than a bug. I have a field set as the key for lookups in a ms sql database which I have created a relationship with. I have it set as a drop down, and it is showing 2 fields (last name and first name). Unfortunately, it only shows 1 person per last name in the sorted list (example, there are 5 people with the last name "Bennett" but only 1 shows). After driving myself nuts trying to find the error, I found the following in the filemaker troubleshooting section:
"
If the value list is defined to display information from two fields, items will not be duplicated for the field on which the value list is sorted. For example, if the value list displays information from the Company field and the Name field, and if the values are sorted by the Company field, only one person from each company will appear in the value list."
As I read it, I can't do what I need to do with a value list (display EVERY last name from the sql file) so what other options do I have? I have experimented with creating a portal which DOES show a list of ALL the last names and first names, but I don't know/understand enough to know what logic/functionality I need so if I click one of the people in the portal list it will do the same thing as if I clicked it in a dropdown value list, which is to then do the lookups and populate the rest of the fields in this database from the information in the record in the sql database. Any and all help would be greatly appreciated, and I appreciate any help any of you can offer. Thank you!
There might be some things that cause this;
You cannot create a link based on a calculation that needs to be calculated each time (Filemaker does not know what to do with this, logical in a way)
Based on what you do I would personally link the two tables based on an lets say company ID instead of a name, as a one to many join. This will definitely eliminate the 'feature' filemaker has of showing unique names only in the joined table. On database level I would join on ID, on Value list I would select the ID as first field and the (calculated) name as second field, than showing only the second field (option in the value list definition popup) for your selection list.
Hope this helps.
I have created an adaptation of the 'Goods' database that includes a quote feature. The user selects the customer (customer table), Product (product table), qty, discount ect.
The chosen entities then get saved to the quotes table and there is a 'print' function on form.
Whilst the information can be saved and the quote prints via a quote report, I'm having major difficulty in finding a way to add multiple products to a single quote.
The main objective is to be able to select various products and add their total price (product after addition of qty, discount) to a SUB TOTAL
Quote total is therefore the formula Tax+Shipping+SubTotal
any takers? :)
Hi guys,
Thanks for the response I really appreciate it. As for tax and shipping, they are just added in the form and are not pushed from anywhere else in the database. Its simply a type in form and display on report sort of thing. As you said in the answer, HansUp, the salesperson will compute it seperately and just input it.
As for tax, products will be shiped globally so the tax/vat shall be computed seperately also.
Also, each table DOES have its own unique ID.
More to the point of having QuoteProducts. I can't seem to get my head around it! Are you saying that whatever products are chosen in QuoteProducts will create a QuoteProd_ID and then that ID's total price will therefore be added to the Quote?
I tried making a subform before but through the 'multiple records' form but obviously every selection made its own ID. Is there any way you could elaborate on the Quote products part and how it allows multiple records to store to one ID? Without understanding it i'm pretty much useless.
In addition, how the multiple records are then added up to make the subtotal also baffles me. Is that done in the Quote form?
Edit 2
HALLELUJAH.
It works! I created a sum in a textbox on the footer of the subform and then pushed that into subtotal :)
I do have one slight issue:
I made a lookup&relationship for the ListPrice. I don't think its the correct way to do it as it comes up with the price of every light (i.e 10 products priced £10, £10 shows up ten times in dropdown).
Can you guys help?
List Price Problem
here's what i've tried:
1) Create >Client>Query Design
2) Show Products, QuoteDetails. For some reason, it automtically comes up with ListPrice, ProductID (as it should) and Product Name linked to ID in Products
3) Delete links with ListPrice and ProductName.
4) Show all in quoteDetails (*)
5) Create Multiple Items form
Doesnt work! What am I doing wrong?
I'm extremely grateful for both your help. If I can do anything, just shout.
Ryan
In addition to HansUp's stellar answer, you might be interested in DatabaseAnswers.org. They have a number of data models for free that might provide additional insight to your situation and possibly serve as inspiration for future projects you may encounter.
Edit 1
Forget about the form and report for a moment - they are important but not as important as the data and how you store the data.
In your current design, you have a quotes table presumably with an autonumber key field. For the purposes of this answer, this field is named Quote_ID.
The quotes table, as HansUp suggested, should store information such as the Customer_ID, Employee_ID, OrderDate and perhaps even a reference to a BillingAddress and ShippingAddress.
The quotes table SHOULD NOT store anything about the products that the customer has ordered as part of this quote.
Instead, this information should be stored in a table called QuoteProducts or QuoteDetails.
It's structure would look something like the following:
QuoteDetails_ID --> Primary Key of the table (autonumber field)
Quote_ID --> Foreign key back to the Quotes table
Product_ID --> Foreign key back to Products table
Quantity
UnitPrice
You may also want to consider a field for tax and a separate field for shipping per line item on the quote. You will inevitably run into situations where certain items are taxable in some locations and not others, etc.
This design allows a particular quote to have any number of products assigned to the quote.
Returning to your form \ reports, you would need to change your existing forms and reports to accomodate this new table design. Typically one would use a main form for the quote itself, and then a subform for the quote details (item, price, quantity, etc).
To get the quote total, you would sum the items in QUoteDetails for a particular Quote_ID.
You may also want to check out the Northwind sample database from Microsoft. From what I recall Northwind had a sample Orders system that might help make these ideas more concrete for you by seeing a working example.
For the first 3 tables mentioned in your comment, each should have a primary key: Customers, customer_id; products, product_id; and employees, employee_id.
The quotes table will have its own primary key, quote_id, and will store customer_id and employee_id as foreign keys. (I'm assuming you want employee_id to record which customer representative/salesperson created the quote.) You may also decide to include additional attributes for each quote; date and time quote prepared, for example.
The products offered for quotes will be stored in a junction table, QuoteProducts. It will have foreign keys for quote_id and product_id, with one row for each product offered in the quote. This is also where you can store the attributes quantity and discount. An additional field, unit_price, can allow you to store the product price which was effective at the time the quote was prepared ... which would be useful in case product prices change over time. I don't know whether tax should be included in this table (see below).
I also don't know how to address shipping. If all the products associated with a quote are intended to be delivered in one shipment, shipping cost could be an attribute of the quotes table. I don't know how you intend to derive that value. Seems like it might be determined by shipping method, distance, and weight. If you have the salesperson compute that value separately, and then input the value, consider how to handle the case where the product selection changes after the shipping fee has been entered.
That design is somewhat simplistic, but might be sufficient for the situation you described. However, it could get more complex. For example, if you decide to maintain a history of product price changes, you would be better off to build in provisions for that now. Also, I have no idea how tax applies in your situation --- whether it's a single rate applied to all products, varies by customer location, varies by type of customer, and/or varies by product. Your business rules for taxes will need to be accommodated in the schema design.
However, if that design works for you (test it by entering dummy data into the tables without using a form), you could create a form based on quotes with a subform based on QuoteProducts. With quote_id as the link master/child property, the subform will allow you to view all products associated with the main form's current quote_id. You can use the subform to add, remove, and/or edit products associated with that quote.
Not much I can say about the report. There is a lot of uncertainty in the preceding description. However, if your data base design allows you to build a workable form/subform, it should also support a query which gathers the same data. Use that query as the record source for the report. And use the report's sorting and grouping features to create the quote grand total.
Edit: With the main form/ subform approach, each new row in the subform should "inherit" the quote_id value of the current record in the main form. You ensure that happens by setting the link master/child properties to quote_id. Crystal Long explains that in more detail in chapter 5 of Access Basics by Crystal: PDF file. Scroll down to the heading Creating a Main Form and Subform on page 24.
Edit2: Your strategy may include storing Products.ListPrice in QuoteDetails.ListPrice. That would be useful to record the current ListPrice offered for a quote. If so, you can fetch ListPrice from Products and store it in QuoteDetails when you select the ProductID for a row in the subform. You can do that with VBA code in the after update event of the control which is bound to the ProductID field. So if that control is a combo box named cboProductID and the subform control bound to the QuoteDetails ListPrice field is a text box named txtListPrice, use code like this for cboProductID after update:
Me.txtListPrice = DLookup("ListPrice", "Products", "ProductID = " _
& Me.cboProductID)
That suggestion assumes the Products and QuoteDetails tables both include a ProductID field and its data type is numeric. And cboProductID has ProductID as its bound field and uses a query as its RowSource similar to this:
SELECT ProductID, ProductName
FROM Products
ORDER BY ProductName;