Coding tips (for partners)
      Back to home
      1. Visual Scheduling Tips & Tricks
      2. Visual Service Scheduler (VSS) for Dynamics NAV
      3. Coding tips (for partners)

      Visualize resource absences via negative resource capacities

      In addition to the default visual alerts, you can highlight resources' unavailabilties by individual signals

      Many users of the VSS wanted to have visual signals for highlighting a resource's unavailability such as specific "downtimes", absences, and external blockades in addition to the default visual alerts (allocations being later than the response date).

      Different kinds of unavailabilities

      Absences can arise from various causes such as

      • illness,
      • business trips
      • training
      • machine maintencance and repair
      • resources blocked by other modules (i.e. Assembly and Jobs)

      By defining different colors and/or tooltips for the different kinds of unavailabilities you can always quickly grasp not only that a resource is unavailable but also why. This is done in 3 steps.

      Step #1: Specify the kinds of unavailabilities

      Currently, this is done by global text constants in the codeunit 5416200 (NETRONIC VSS Management). 

      There you can specify a color and a relating tooltip text, grouped as couple. Note that the color is set as HTML Color, e.g., #FFFFFF for white, #000000 for black, #FF0000 for red etc. 

      In our case, we want to display holidays in green.

      Color_Holiday

      The options in detail

      1. TEXT7301 und TEXT7302 determine color and tooltip text for cases where a daily capacity greater than 24 h was calculated (possibly by mistake).
      2. TEXT7303 and TEXT7304 determine color and tooltip text for cases where a daily capacity less than 0 h was calculated (possibly by mistake).
      3. TEXT7305 and TEXT7306 determine color and tooltip text for resource blockades caused by the Job Module. Note to tick the corresponding checkbox in the Setup dialog.
      4. TEXT7307 and TEXT7308 determine color and tooltip text for resource blockades caused by the Assembly Module. Note to tick the corresponding checkbox in the Setup dialog.
      5. TEXT7310 determines the default color for usual non-working times.
      6. TEXT7311 and TEXT7312 determine color and tooltip text for downtimes that are not further specified.
      7. TEXT7313 to TEXT7330 let you determine specified downtimes.

      Please note the following: 

      1. Absences or downtimes are always caused by a negative record in the Res. Capacity Entry table.
      2. These records are read by the LoadResourceData method of the above mentioned code unit.

      Step #2 - Add comment field to Resource Capacity Table

      Now you have to add a comment field to the table Resource Capacity in NAV where you enter the kind of unavailabilties corresponding to the global text constants you have defined earlier in the codeunit 541620. This makes sure that the comment assigned to the record will be checked for appearing in the TextConstants TEXT7313, TEXT7315, TEXT7317, TEXT7319, TEXT7321, TEXT7323, TEXT7325, TEXT7327 or TEXT7329 and the corresponding color will be applied. 

      If the relating DOT.NET object doesn’t get a comment while being read, color and tooltip text as described under #6 of the above list will be applied.

      Add_Comment2

      Step #3 - Modify the CA/L code

      Now adjust the CA/L code to your new constants as shown below. If we want to display absences of resource Linda that are due to holidays by the text "Holiday" and the color green, the code has to look as follows: 

      vss_highlight_absences_code_3

      Result

      As a result of the above described code modifications, Linda's holidays are displayed like shown in the picture below. This way, unavailabilities of resources can easily be recognized and interpreted. 

      Absences_Result