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Changing the List of People Report
From Upper Case to Lower Case

(Note: This is only applicable to TMG v4.x and earlier.)

Various users have noted that the List of People Report prints names differently depending on whether given and surnames are printed as a single entity or printed separately.  As a single entity, names are printed in mixed case (i.e., John Doe or Smith, Jayne).  When given and surnames are printed separately, each is printed in all upper-case letters (i.e., JOHN, JAYNE, SMITH, and DOE).  A convention for many people is to have the Surname in all upper-case letters while leaving the given name in mixed case.  While most users probably don't really care, others may want to have the given and/or surnames in mixed case in their reports.

Since many users have asked for the capability, Bob Velke posted the instructions for printing these fields in mixed case.  The procedure is not hard.  But if you are not sure of yourself, you may prefer to ask a friend or neighbor who is knowledgeable about computers to help you.  It is not difficult, but you do need to be careful.  

The following steps should be followed closely:

  1. Back up the files TMGW\ADMIN\FILTCOL.DBF and TMGW\ADMIN\FILTCOL.FPT as these are the two files  that are involved.  If something goes wrong, all you should have to do is restore these two files.
  2. Enter TMGW and click on Tools=>Advanced Utilities=>Browse a DBF File from the menu.
  3. Answer Yes to the Warning message to continue.
  4. Select the ADMIN directory and the FILTCOL.DBF file from the file list.
  5. Scroll down the file to the 671st record.  There is no record numbering for the file, so you will have to count each line or estimate by pressing PgDn a bunch of times.   You will be looking for a record where Type=n (lower case n) and Value=Given Name.    (Be very careful as the 695th record is similar where Type=N (upper case N) which is incorrect).
  6. Tab over to the Disp_synt field, hold down the Control key and press PgDn to open the edit window.
  7. The edit window should have PADR(CONCAT(NFILE.NAME,3),FO_LEN[T]) which you will need to change to PADR(CONCAT(NFILE.NAME,3,.F.),FO_LEN[T]) by adding a comma, a period, the letter F, and another period.
  8. Hold down the Control key and press W to save the change and close the edit window and will allow the given name to be printed in mixed case.
  9. If you want the surname to be printed in all upper case letters, then skip ahead to step 14.
  10. If you want the surname to be printed in mixed case letters, then scroll down nine (9) records to the record which has Type=n (lower case n) and Value=Surname.
  11. Tab over to the Disp_synt field, hold down the Control key and press PgDn to open the edit window.
  12. The edit window should have PADR(CONCAT(NFILE.NAME,1),FO_LEN[T]) which you will need to change to PADR(CONCAT(NFILE.NAME,1,.F.),FO_LEN[T]) in the same way as above.
  13. Hold down the Control key and press W to save the change and close the edit window and will allow the surname to be printed in mixed case.
  14. Hold down the Control key and press W again to save the file and return to the TMGW main screen.

You should now be able to generate List of People reports with Given Names and/or Surnames printed in mixed case characters depending on whether you followed step 9 or 10 above.

As you may realize from browsing the various records in the FILTCOL.DBF, there are other similar records in the file.  At least one user has experimented with the changing the settings for the similar records in much the same way as those noted above and has had success. While you can accomplish many different effects doing this, it can cause unexpected results and you should be very careful of changes that you make.  If a change does not appear to change anything, don't leave it changed as it may affect something that you have not tried..

Also please make sure you have a good backup of the two files noted above before you start this process. 


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