Summary
Important Observations
- &FLD_<field name> components allow you to determine the component name based on the value of a field. In this example, the field value was based on user input. The value could also be set based on information in a database file.
- The importance of &FLD_<field name> is that you can use RDML to control the value of the field during execution of the function.
Tips & Techniques
- In some cases, you can use &FLD_<field name> as an alternative to <RDML CONDITION> or <RDML NOTCONDITION> tags. Instead of using conditional tags, you can control HTML components by setting the field values (in the RDML) used in the &FLD_<field name>. For example, IF a certain condition is met, then set the field value to COMP1, where COMP1 is a component with the desired HTML.
- You can embed components within components, provided that they are not called recursively.
- In this example, you created a very simple personalization based on the user login. You could create a highly personalized Welcome screen if you maintain additional data in a database for the login user ID. For example, you could display the last time a user visited the site or you could show a list of user preferences, etc.
- Create page components to protect your HTML changes from being lost when a function is recompiled.
- Using &FLD_<field name> allows you to customize what a user/users might see for the same page, depending on their login authority.
- Remember to use the proper mode when defining your Web components. The iiiMYLOG component uses mode Not Applicable because it appears in the function header.
What I Should Know
- How to use &FLD_<field name> to dynamically set a Web component based on the value of a field.
- How to embed a component within a component.
- How to create page components to protect HTML from being replaced when a function is recompiled.