I wondered if you had a nice one-to-many diagram for the tables as they stand. I'm really only concerned about contacts, projects, invoices, appointments... none of the calendar or gantt chart stuff.

Companies----<Contacts----<Invoices-----<InvoiceLineItems
InventoryItems------<InvoiceLineItems
Invoices------<Payments
etc...
The whole one-to-many map.

I'm trying to figure out how to transfer my data from my current project/invoicing system and determine what mods I'll need to make to my data or to the SeedCode Complete structure.

For example, I have a simple Ledger to track income/expense and don't seem to see if that's already in Complete. An ER Diagram would be a huge help. Doesn't have to be fancy! Just entity boxes and chicken feet connectors.

Thanks. -Charlie

Hi Charlie.

We don't have an ERD for Complete. The graph for each section should tell you everything you need to know.

In the example you suggested--income and expense--- there is no payments table, so we're not recording multiple payments against each invoice: there is just a simple amount paid field at the invoice level. And while we have a table of invoice items, the items table does not (yet) have a cost field associated with an item. You'll likely want to build out some of this on the accounting side.

If you have specific questions like that you don't see expressed in the graph I'll be happy to answer them.

John

OK, thanks John.
Seems like it would be pretty handy to have an ERD, and I don't mean to sound harsh, but I think it's required when selling a development environment. It would only take an hour or two to whip one up and would be an incredible resource to your customer base.

I find Relationship Graphs (especially in single file solutions) define so much business logic they can actually disguise the structure. Yours is wonderfully organized, don't get me wrong, but a one page print out of the tables and their relation to other tables would be invaluable.

You could leave out the calendar portion in my opinion. You'll see that I left it out in my ERD below. Since there's no user data stored there, it's not integral to the ERD.

The first thing Kitty asked when we started discussing an IBM conversion was what documentation I had. I showed her this ERD and the conversation took 5 minutes. From a data management perspective it's everything you need to know. The rest is all business logic.


I don't mind sharing this ERD. Maybe it will help others on the board visualize their table structures.

charliecheney wrote:I find Relationship Graphs (especially in single file solutions) define so much business logic they can actually disguise the structure.

Guess we'll have to disagree about how useful ERDs are for FMP solutions.

But I'll look at it and see if there is something I can put together that won't be misleading.

(In my opinion that is what ERDs are when it comes to FMP solutions: they are a great tool for sketching what one wants to build, but I find them poor at describing what one has built.)

I can absolutely see your point about *not* describing what's built. It doesn't describe the business logic at all. But that's OK by me. The business logic can be adapted as long as the structure is sound underneath.

And to your point, that's why having an ER Diagram for the calendar or gantt chart portions is unneeded for me. I know it's business logic magic and I don't really even want to know *how* that works, lol. I just trust you on that stuff.

But when bolting on the Contacts, Projects, and Invoices, I'd like to see a quick overview of what it is we have and how it will address my data handling needs. Like you said, it's a big part of the sketch. Then I'd know right off the bat "oh, I'll need a payments table, I'll need an inventory table, I'll need a PO solution, but I won't need a lineitems table, mailings table, or a user table, cool."

By the way, the fact that you have an inferred "Company" table is awesome! I made that exact same choice 8 years ago with Indie Band Manager and have never regretted it.

Thanks again for all your hard work on this John, the more I use it the more I like it. It's an elegant piece of work and I hope you feel you're getting the kudos you deserve. I'm really grateful for what you've made.