CiviCRM Community Forums (archive)

check:

http://civicrm.org/taxonomy/term/26

and the svn code repository at:

http://svn.civicrm.org/sfschool/trunk/

i've written custom code in there to store values in a multiple value custom field (check the extended care classes). it uses a fair amount of civicrm hooks and a lot of the civicrm data model

lobo

Just sharing a sidebar that I had with Eileen who said:

The multiple value custom fields are pretty new & haven't really been developed to the point where they are easy to use.

I haven't looked into the area much so you probably are better posting on the forum. Assuming you are using Drupal a Views / CCK solution might be the way to go. Also, you should probably consider using activities rather than multiple value custom fields.

You can extend activities by adding custom fields to them and you can customise the types. They are exposed to views & you would also be able to see them on both people's activities tab. (You could rename the tab if it's an issue). If the people adding the ratings have access to CiviCRM then no coding would be required to allow them to add activities. I assume the voters would never log on so that there is no risk of them seeing the activities via their contact dashboard.

I replied: I'll continue to consider the activity option, but we don't really want to run people through civicrm main screens.  The idea really is to allow voters who are authenticated users, but not necessarily known to the campaign, to start campaigning on their own. So I need to give them a simple view and assure that they can't do any damage or violate anyone's privacy -- they can just see voter lists, enter their own ratings of other voters based on the conversations that they have.  So, I'm thinking the programming of a couple of custom screens will be roughly the same whether we store data in activity records or in a custom field group.  But maybe I'd like having the civicrm screens that handle activities available -- so that's an argument for using activities.  I guess I'm leaning towards a custom group -- it will be cleaner and less risk of any kind of conflict than using activities.  Once we learn how to do the first screen or two, the rest will be easy.

I looked at Views/CCK, but that doesn't seem to offer the ability to nicely customize an update screen -- vision the campaigner browsing a list of voters and entering ratings next to each (as they walked down the street, in the ultimate case).  In future phases, we might develop functions to allow the campaigner to temporarily claim a small set of voters that they working on so as to avoid double coverage.  There are other possible extensions -- showing them a phone script, etc.  I think we'll have more flexibility to customize down the road if we learn to use the Smarty forms and appropriately extend CiviCRM. 

I appreciate your taking the time to reply and welcome any further wisdom.

I agree with Eileen that the UI / web interfaces for multiple value custom fields are fairly simple / non-existent. But i think the data model is awesome, the support from the admin end is acceptable and it can be used in multiple ways. based on what little i've used within the school group, the "rules" for each custom group are different (update vs insert) and specific to its use, so i suspect that it will be some time before it makes it way to the front end

I think for long term viability of any software code, you have to fit it with the appropriate model. I would use activities if they are appropriate and meets your needs and not because they are convenient

lobo

Will,
Sounds like a lot of cool and useful stuff!

I've given your account blogging permissions on civicrm.org - so you can post here:

>> http://civicrm.org/blog/6885

It would be great if your blog post includes the "big picture" (what your organization "does" and how they're using CiviCRM in their workflows), along with some discussion of gaps / what else is needed in the "toolbox" and any plans you have for building stuff.

If your work is open source (hopefully :-) ), it would also be awesome if you could include a link to your repository or some other method for folks to get their hands / look at / use or learn from the code.

check:

http://civicrm.org/licensing

lobo

P.S.  Any recommendations about where to put up some php routines -- I can put them up as forum posts on my own website and post links, but am happy to put them in some other place if that's better.