KnowledgeSync "Did You Know?" -- When a Value Changes

In many issues of "KnowledgeSync News", we like to focus on a single technical aspect of the application that warrants a little extra explanation. This issue, the subject will be:

"Triggering an Event When a Database Field Value Changes"

KnowledgeSync's ability to monitor for a change to the value of a database field is very handy -- but there are a number of potential "gotchas" that you need to be aware of.

Also -- KnowledgeSync's ability to monitor for a change to the value of a database field is ideally meant for those applications that do not have the ability to audit changes within their own databases. If an application does support auditing, it is more efficient to have KnowledgeSync directly monitor the audit file rather than duplicating the effort to keep track of changes.

If an application does not audit itself, KnowledgeSync can do the trick. But - be careful that you do not have KnowledgeSync auditing too many database fields (or a very high number of records) as this can cause a slowdown of the KnowledgeSync system.

Here are 3 items that you should be aware of when it comes to using KnowledgeSync to track changes to database field values:

1. Your query must have a unique column and it must not be calculated. 

Any query that checks for a change to a field's value must have a single unique column identified. The "Column Name Selected" must not be edited in any way -- this means that this must not be a calculated field. And -- whatever field(s) you wish to monitor for a changed value must be selected as columns for this query.  

   2.  You must not modify the "Customized Name" of the unique column.

Whatever column you identify as the "unique" for the query, you must be careful NOT to change the default "customized name" of that field. In other words, the customized name of that column must be exactly the same as the column name itself. For example, if the unique column is "account.id", the customized name of this field must read "id" in order for the "change" logic to work correctly.

   3.  You can check for a value "changed to" 'x'.

If you want to create a query that checks to see when a field's value has changed to 'x' (e.g., when a call's priority changes to 'high'), you would do the following:

• Go to the Filters tab of a query and click on the button called "If Column Values Have Changed" and then select the "priority" field.

• Go back to the main Filters tab and add a filter on the "priority" field.

• In the "Compare Value" of this filter, select 'High'.

This logic will then cause an event to trigger if the value of the priority field changes AND if it changes to (i.e., the current value is) 'High'.