User Support Forum

Hi,

We're working on cleaning up PowerChurch data. With multiple people working in the database over the years, and not all of them highly skilled at data management, it's quite a mess. Our big push has been to deactivate people who are no longer involved, which we mostly do with the Personal Profiles "Status" field. I thought we were making great progress until I discovered that there are over 100 people who have no Status at all! So the first question is whether there is any way to flag certain fields as Required, so that it is not possible to create a record without filling in the field?

I'd actually like to see the Required Fields idea taken one step further, where one could build wizards for various events and the fields that get updated. For example, if someone joins, we should change their status from visitor to member, note down the date they joined, make sure we know their baptism status and date if available, note whether they joined by transfer or affirmation of faith, etc. And of course an audit log of who made this change and when.

Re. audit logs: we often need to figure out who made changes when and why. We're currently on PC 11.55. After I resurrected an old thread here, Neil Zampella suggested that I try the audit log feature in PowerChurch 12. I've downloaded the 12.2 demo. I've been able to confirm that it tracks adds and deletes of both Family and Personal records (even though it only appears under the Personal Profiles menu). It logs the date, time, partial user name, and a brief note about the add or delete. However it does not track data changes e.g. an address or Status update, which would ideally be displayed in a tab under the Family and Personal records. And there is no way to add a reason for the change, e.g. "joined church" or "moved away".

I know that required fields and field-level auditing are a lot to ask (I have actually developed an insurance database that does both), but those features could really help in creating consistent data in the first place, and in figuring out why certain data looks like it does.

If there is anything I'm missing, let me know!

Thanks,

Mark Berry

pbumc wrote: ↑

Tue Aug 25, 2020 7:23 pm

Hi,

We're working on cleaning up PowerChurch data. With multiple people working in the database over the years, and not all of them highly skilled at data management, it's quite a mess. Our big push has been to deactivate people who are no longer involved, which we mostly do with the Personal Profiles "Status" field. I thought we were making great progress until I discovered that there are over 100 people who have no Status at all! So the first question is whether there is any way to flag certain fields as Required, so that it is not possible to create a record without filling in the field?

You can setup in the Family Mailing list preferences, a default mailing category, and you can do the same with the personal profiles under preferences. I always feel that its a training issue; anyone who has permission to add to the membership database should know how to enter a new family.

I'd actually like to see the Required Fields idea taken one step further, where one could build wizards for various events and the fields that get updated. For example, if someone joins, we should change their status from visitor to member, note down the date they joined, make sure we know their baptism status and date if available, note whether they joined by transfer or affirmation of faith, etc. And of course an audit log of who made this change and when.

Re. audit logs: we often need to figure out who made changes when and why. We're currently on PC 11.55. After I resurrected an old thread here, Neil Zampella suggested that I try the audit log feature in PowerChurch 12. I've downloaded the 12.2 demo. I've been able to confirm that it tracks adds and deletes of both Family and Personal records (even though it only appears under the Personal Profiles menu). It logs the date, time, partial user name, and a brief note about the add or delete. However it does not track data changes e.g. an address or Status update, which would ideally be displayed in a tab under the Family and Personal records. And there is no way to add a reason for the change, e.g. "joined church" or "moved away".

I know that required fields and field-level auditing are a lot to ask (I have actually developed an insurance database that does both), but those features could really help in creating consistent data in the first place, and in figuring out why certain data looks like it does.

If there is anything I'm missing, let me know!

Thanks,

Mark Berry

I'd take those last two ideas, and write them up (cut and paste) and send them to wishlist@powerchurch.com, and they may eventually show up in the program.

Neil, thanks for the suggestions.

You can setup in the Family Mailing list preferences, a default mailing category, and you can do the same with the personal profiles under preferences. I always feel that its a training issue; anyone who has permission to add to the membership database should know how to enter a new family.

Hmm... I see we have "Visitor - New" as the default personal status. Not sure that defaults are a good idea--they make it even harder to identify incorrectly created records than if the field is just left blank.

Yes, it's a training issue. The problem is, who really knows the system to do the training? Initially set up by a secretary 20 years ago, the new secretary pretty much knew how to do it, but then she up and left for heaven without advance notice. Random volunteers trying to help out with attendance, a bad employee, finally a good employee... As the I.T. guy, I can try to figure out what they need and document the procedures, but there is no guarantee that the latest person will find and follow the documentation. The more controls and idiot-proofing that can be built in to the system the better!

I'll forward a couple suggestions to the wish list.