Button to Open Method Tracker or Any Form

[NateS (Nate Schoonover)]

Good morning,
I am trying to crack this tough nut again. See previous users attempts here:

Adding Method Tracker to MES

I added a Method Tracker button to the MES menu, and the issue is that it launches Engineering Workbench. When I looked at the menu item, I saw that the program DLL is for Engineering Workbench. I’ve read a few threads on this site that detail how to run some SQL code to use the BOMTracker form instead. But Method Tracker launches fine from the menu, just not from the MES Menu. Is there anything I have to specify in the customization to force Method Tracker to launch?

Method Tracker opens Engineering Workbench

I’ve run into a problem where Method Tracker opens to Engineering Workbench. This can happen during a conversion, update, or adding Method Tracker to a menu. In Epicor 9 we would open SQL Server Manager Studios and write a simple update query: update menu set arguments = ‘-c MyMethodTracker -formname=BOMTrackerForm’ where menuid = ‘METHOD’ //this will change for each Method Tracker you need updated// In Epicor 10 the process has changed: Customize the method tracker screen a) On the Ep…

I have a custom form that I use to add operations to a part method master. The custom form works great, but I would like to add a button to open the methods tracker form. That way a user can quickly check to see that the part has been updated correctly.

As you can see in the second post linked above, I attempted to create a button on my custom form like this:

private void epiButtonC2_Click(object sender, System.EventArgs args)
{
// ** Place Event Handling Code Here **
LaunchFormOptions lfo = new LaunchFormOptions();
lfo.ContextValue = "PartNum, RevisionNum";
ProcessCaller.LaunchForm(oTrans, "UDGO3000", lfo); 	
}

Just like other users have said, this opens the Engineering Workbench instead of Method Tracker. @josecgomez, you said this is not a trivial form to open due to the constraints required. Can you elaborate on how one might pass the right parameters, and get the methods master form to open via a button click on a custom form?

12/3/20 EDIT: I have run several traces, and I can’t seem to find the BO that is used to open a form. The action seems to be taking place within the GenXDataImpl BO. But it looks like they are all GetByID or GetByList methods. Does the trace document the call to open the method tracker form?

12/9/20 EDIT: Still no lock launching the method form, I always get the engineering workbench. I modified the title of this post a bit to be more inclusive. Perhaps someone could get me started by explaining how to open any form from a button click. Is ProcessCaller.LaunchForm the only/best way?

Thanks a bunch for your time!
Nate

[Nancy_Hoyt]

Hi Nate,

I’m back trying to do this in a new place also, having had difficulties and giving up in a different area a couple years back. Did you ever figure this out?

Thanks
Nancy

[NateS (Nate Schoonover)]

Hi Nancy,
Unfortunately, no. My button still opens the Engineering Workbench instead of Method Tracker. If you get anywhere with this, please share it here!
Thanks!
Nate

[jkane (John Kane)]

Can’t they just open the method tracker through the Context menu for the revision?

[NateS (Nate Schoonover)]

I have found that the Method Tracker is not always there when I add the revision field. I can open the part tracker, and then dive into the rev from there, but I can’t get to method tracker from my own form, no matter what I have tried.

[jkane (John Kane)]

And you can’t add it to the context menu for that field/form?

[NateS (Nate Schoonover)]

How would I go about that?

[jkane (John Kane)]

What is the dataview you are using?

[NateS (Nate Schoonover)]

I am not sure what you mean. I started with a UBAQ “AddAnyOp”. From that, I created a customized dashboard that shows the results of that query, as well as a blank tracker form that I customized to have a bunch of fields and buttons. Where is the dataview you are referenceing?

[jkane (John Kane)]

I didn’t realize it was a dashboard.

Have you tried calling XAGO3000?

[NateS (Nate Schoonover)]

@jkane

Have you tried calling XAGO3000?

Yes, Although I didn’t mention it here, using XAGO3000 also opens EngWorkbench.

[jkane (John Kane)]

When you are in the Part Maintenance screen, the Context Menu option for the Method Tracker on the Revisions page is hard coded. (No idea why.)

If you go into the Context Menu Maintenance screen and pull up PartRev.RevisionNum add a new Menu Item and call Process ID XAGO3000.

The only problem is that the Part Maintenance Revision context menu will look like this.

Where the Method Tracker Revision context menu will look like this.

[jkane (John Kane)]

@NateS

Yes, Although I didn’t mention it here, using XAGO3000 also opens EngWorkbench.

Well, using the context menu with XAGO3000 opens the Method Tracker.

[Nancy_Hoyt]

Hi John,

You’re right, it works! It was a little wonky with runtime dashboard at first but I think I now have it working in a stable manner with a deployed dashboard (after clearing client cache well).

So Nate, I have a dashboard that pulls JobMatl and JobOper data in and I wanted to do an “open with” in the dashboard on the part revision field in the JobMatl and JobOper data (second screenshot below). Per John’s context menu suggestion (first screenshot), I added Method Tracker to the PartRev.RevisionNum menu (NOT the PartRev.RevisionNumber menu), per below. Now I have the “open with” off of a PartRev field from the Job header /matl data working. I did at one point also have it open the engineering workbench instead of the Method tracker. I’m not sure how it got fixed, perhaps I was trying to use the PartRev.RevisionNumber context menu, or I didn’t deploy assembly. I lost track when I was so excited that it worked!

One other thing, the addition of the Method Tracker to the PartRev.RevisionNum does show it duplicate on my open with from part entry similar to John’s post (screenshot 3). It doesn’t seem to hurt so I think I’ll just tell anyone who asks to use either, it doesn’t matter.

Hope this helps you too,
Nancy

[LBARKER (Lawson Barker)]

Hello @NateS , I’ve had a similar problem trying to launch a Form from a button where the base program has multiple forms, I used a program called ILSpy to have a look under the bonnet to see how the LFO was handled by the form… I found that it had an LFO object to choose which form to load…

I’ve just had a look at Engineering Workbench and it has similar

[cfinley (Chance Finley)]

Kudos to @gingerhelp for us for the ILSpy tip.

[mdubeau (Matt Dubeau)]

Just in case there’s still interest here. LBarker got to the heart of it. But to make it more explicit, pass the values in with BOMTrackerArgs instead of LaunchFormOptions.

	private void btnLaunchMethodTracker_Click(object sender, System.EventArgs args)

	{
		// ** Place Event Handling Code Here **

		string partNum = partNumber.Text;
		string revNum = revNumber.Text;
		string altMethod = "";
		bool isModal = false;

		if (partNum != String.Empty)
		{
		   BOMTrackerArgs bta = new BOMTrackerArgs(partNum, revNum, altMethod, isModal);
		   ProcessCaller.LaunchForm(oTrans, "XAGO3000", bta); 
		}	
		
	}```

[Edwar_Arturo_Carrill (Edwar Arturo Carrillo Rueda)]

That’s the right answer, it worked perfectly for me, thank you so much