Using Locate and Lookup Lists in PowerChurch Plus

Most any screen that you open in PowerChurch Plus will have a lookup function of some sort. It is a database application, after all! When you see this or this in the program, you know it's going to open something that looks like this:

What you might not know is that you don't necessarily have to use those annoying little arrow buttons at the top and bottom of the scroll bar to move through the list. First off, it would take all day, but more importantly, those things seem to have a mind of their own! When you are scrolling through a few hundred rows, your clicks start getting backed up and when you take your finger off the mouse, it keeps scrolling and scrolling and scrolling until you are way too far down the list.

If your mouse has a scroll wheel, you can use it to slowly scroll through the list without clicking the arrows on the scroll bar. However, this will still take a long time to get through the list. Pressing the Page Down button on the keyboard allows you to skip through the list one screen height at a time. This still isn't ideal, though.

If you know the name of the person, vendor, contribution fund, or whatever it is that you are looking for, you can type the name on the keyboard and the cursor will jump down through the list, "seeking" out what you are typing. So, if you type "J" into the Family Mailing List Locate window, the cursor will jump past all the families whose last names start with A through I and the first family whose last name starts with J is selected. If you type "J O N" then you're probably getting close to the person you are looking for, if they aren't selected already.

But, let's say you only know the first name of the person that you are looking for. Seeking through the last names won't help. Another under-utilized feature in PowerChurch Plus is that these lookup lists are re-sortable. Just click on the First Name column header at the top and now the list is in first name order. If you're looking for someone named Melody, you just start typing "M E L" and the cursor jumps to the first name it finds that starts with those letters, like Melanie. At this point, the Melody that you are looking for is probably in view now and you can select them without typing anything else.

You can also look up families or profiles by their street address right from the Locate list. Just sort on the Current Address column, then start typing the address.

Some Locate buttons have a little arrow on the side, like this: . If you click on this arrow instead of the main part of the button, you will get extra options to choose from. On the Personal Profiles screen, clicking the arrow on the Locate button allows you to locate by e-mail address or envelope number. These two fields of information aren't normally shown in the Locate list, but if you are trying to find someone by their e-mail address, this is a slick way to do it.

One more keyboard shortcut to be aware of is the F2 key along the top row of keys on your keyboard. Any time you are in a field that has a magnifying glass icon next to it, like the Envelope Number or Fund Number field on the Enter Contributions screen, press the F2 key instead of clicking the magnifying glass button to open the Lookup List. This shortcut also works with date fields. Pressing the F2 key opens up the little calendar date picker control.