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What Is Unlimited Field Mapping?

The Unlimited Field Mapping feature lets you use a source plan field that is not already available to you in the Chart Editor. The feature allows you to avoid going back to the Template Properties form to map additional fields for the specific purposes you need without having to recreate a new chart. Hav1ng to recreate a new chart is cumbersome and inefficient, especially if you already invested time editing the original chart before you realized that you needed another source plan field.

The Unlimited Field Mapping (UFM) feature is a vastly more efficient way to bring additional source plan fields into the Chart Editor after you've created and edited your chart. Previously, OnePager only had access to Microsoft Excel source plan fields that were specifically mentioned in the OnePager Template Properties form. With UFM, the Chart Editor can access all source plan fields.

Field Mapping is defined as the use of a source plan field for a particular OnePager purpose. There are more than twenty-five (25) OnePager purposes from Baseline Finish Date to Unique task bar/milestone symbol identifier. You can easily refer back to your source plan and access changed fields from the Chart Editor.

For example, you can populate a Text field in Microsoft Excel and then use that field to present data in an Text Column after the chart is first created. Further, OnePager Express gives you a more efficient way to change the field mapping for seven (7) of the most frequently used OnePager Pro presentation purposes. For OnePager Pro there are eight (8) such purposes because it omits display of critical path information.

For more information on Field Mapping, please see the Frequently Asked Questions topics at: [Field Mapping]

The Field Mapping Tab

The name of the new tab is the Field Mappings tab. Since the Unlimited Field Mapping feature allows you to access all fields from Microsoft Excel source plans at any time in the life cycle of a chart, the Field Mappings tab no longer needs to map fields to extra purposes that are just carried along in case you need them.

The Field Mapping tab focuses on common OnePager purposes that users can map to Microsoft Excel fields after a chart is created. Note, however, that other important OnePager purposes are on Rows/Swimlanes, Task Bars, and Milestones tabs. Some purposes such as Task Name, Percent-Complete, and Critical Path appear both on the Field Mapping tab and on the Task Bars and Milestones tabs. For OnePager Express there are seven (7) purposes named in the Field Mappings tab: (1) Percent-complete, (2) Task-name, (3) Start date, (4) Finish date, (5) Baseline start date, (6) Baseline finish date, (7) Deadline date.

The Field Mappings tab for the Chart Properties form is shown below:

For more information on the Unlimited Column Mapping feature, please see the article at: Unlimited Field Mapping

Special Considerations for the Task/Milestone Identity Mapping Feature

The Field Mappings tab shows the Microsoft Excel field currently being used for the Task/Milestone Identity Mapping feature. In the Chart Properties form, the Task/Milestone Identity Mapping is disabled but tells you which Microsoft Excel field is being used. The Task/Milestone Identity Mapping field being used is specified in the Template Properties form to act as an alternate Unique ID field for OnePager Express UPDATE operations. You can change it to whatever field you want, but it is your responsibility to make sure that the chosen field has a unique value for each task you plan to import and display in OnePager. Having duplicate values in the Unique ID field causes task bars to be omitted and/or misidentified later on when you are doing updates of the chart.

Special Considerations for the Field Splitting Feature

OnePager Express continues to support Field Splitting with the control on the Field Mappings tab in the Template Properties form and Chart Properties forms. Field Splitting can be performed on any source plan string type field with comma-separated components imported before the chart is created. It cannot be changed once a chart is created, though its value is shown in the Chart Properties form to remind you of the splitting that is active in the chart.

Field Mappings

There are four (4) controls groups found on the Field Mappings tab.

Basic Mappings

Within the Basic Mappings control group there are three (3) basic columns already established that can be remapped. You can use any Microsoft Excel field of the appropriate type corresponding to the Basic Mapping field named for the dropdown.

The dropdown list for the Task label field is shown in the example below:

Selecting a different Microsoft Excel field from the dropdown list tells OnePager to go back to the Microsoft Excel source plan, retrieve the data for that field, and use that data for the purpose of the chart. This re-acquisition of Microsoft Excel source plan data is done when you click Apply on the Chart Properties form which keeps the Chart Properties form visible or when you click OK which closes the Chart Properties form. The current chart is updated accordingly in the Chart Editor. The process for the other Basic Mapping fields for Critical-path segments and Task labels is the same as shown above for Percent complete.

Date Mappings

There are five (5) Date Mappings purposes in this control group that are available to be remapped. You can use any Microsoft Excel date field that can be accessed in the individual dropdown lists as shown in the example below:

As with the selections in the Basic Mappings control group, selecting a different Microsoft Excel field from the dropdown list tells OnePager to go back to the Microsoft Excel source plan, retrieve the data for that field, and use that data for the designated the OnePager Express purpose in the chart. This re-acquisition of Microsoft Excel source plan data is done when you click Apply on the Chart Properties form which keeps the Chart Properties form visible or when you click OK which closes the Chart Properties form. The current chart is updated accordingly in the Chart Editor.

Task/Milestone Identity Mapping

Task/Milestone Identity Mapping for OnePager Express Add-in and Desktop

In the Chart Properties form, this control group is informational. The control group is disabled in the Chart Properties form but the Unique Id window shows the setting previously or currently set in the Template Properties form’s Field Mappings tab. As such, the window is for information purposes only and cannot be changed.

The Task/Milestone Identity Mapping control group is shown below:

The Unique Id field shows the Microsoft Excel field that OnePager Express used when it first created the chart. This feature is provided to assist advanced OnePager Express users update charts that were created from source plans where portions of one Microsoft Excel source plan were copied into another. When OnePager updates a chart, it needs to identify each task and milestone that is being imported and find out if it already exists in chart. This is how OnePager preserves the formatting of the task bars/milestone symbols and places them in the same row/swimlane where they resided before the update.

When the data in the source plan are a .xls file, OnePager has traditionally used the Microsoft Excel Task ID field inserted by the user for this purpose. You can control what values of Task ID appear in the .xls file when you copy data into that file. As a result, .xls files that had data copied into them can have problems preserving OnePager Excel's formatting and row/swimlane positioning. To solve this problem, OnePager Express lets you define and use a substitute Microsoft Excel field as an alternative Unique ID for uniquely identifying tasks. You are then responsible for guaranteeing that these field values are preserved when data is copied from one .xls file to another. You are also responsible for making sure that there are no duplicate values in the field designated for his alternative Task ID usage.

The alternate Task ID can be set in one of two places:

1) In the Template Properties form's Field Mappings tab and

2) In the OnePager Choices form's second page by clicking the Edit current template... button.

We strongly recommend that you set the alternate Task ID in the Template Properties form rather than with the OnePager Choices form because this ensures that all charts use a consistent alternative Task ID field.

For more information on Resetting Unique IDs on update, please see this section in the article at: Advanced Tab for OnePager Express - Reset Unique Ids On Update

Field Splitting

As with the control group discussed previously, the Field Splitting control group is disabled but shows the Microsoft Excel field currently set in the Template Properties form as the field participating in field splitting. As such, the window is for information purposes only and cannot be changed.

The Field Splitting control group is shown below:

The Field Splitting control group in the Field Mappings tab of the OnePager Express Chart Properties form works in the same way as it did in the Other Columns tab of previous versions.

For more information on Splitting and parsing columns, please see the article at: Splitting and Parsing Columns-OnePager Express

Related Links

Unlimited Column Mapping

Advanced Tab for OnePager Express-Reset Unique Ids On Update

Splitting and Parsing Columns-OnePager Express

[Field Mapping]

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