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Edit Pattern

Edit patterns make the values in views more readable when they appear on a screen. For example, a United States Social Security number is nine digits long. If the contents of an export view of Social Security Number were displayed, it might appear as shown next:

888888888

However, by applying the edit pattern XXX-XX-XXXX before displaying it, the result is shown next:

888-88-8888

which is the format in which Social Security numbers commonly appear.

There are two categories of edit patterns:

• Standard edit patterns
• Local edit patterns

You should name edit patterns for the domain of the data they represent. For instance, to ensure that all currency values are displayed consistently on every screen that uses them, one might establish a standard edit pattern called Currency.

One striking advantage of using standard edit patterns is how easily you can change the appearance of fields across the system. For example, imagine that a standard edit pattern called Date has the value MM/DD/YY. Assume that all fields implementing attributes of type Date have been assigned the edit pattern Date. If you later wish to change the format to DD.MM.YY, it is possible to change every field in the system that uses the Date edit pattern simply by changing the edit pattern definition.

Local edit patterns are specific to a particular field. Designers should avoid them in favor of standard edit patterns wherever possible, but they are available when required.

The characteristics of edit patterns vary by the attribute type of the view implemented by the field. For instance, YYYY-MM-DD is valid for a field implementing a date attribute but not for one implementing a time attribute.

For a complete definition of the edit patterns supported by CA Gen, see the Toolset Help.

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