Transcript Slide 1
SITS/MAP EXPERTS Standard Reports & Letters ISA Aiming for Excellence TOPICS Understanding Standard Letters and Reports (SRLs). These include creating and generating: emails, letters, reports, labels, MAP to do list messages, SMS texting etc. Creating a Standard Letter Formatting alignment indent bold & italics uppercase and lowercase Generating & Printing Basic HTML. SRL TYPES Letter Letter type SRLs are intended to be printed and are typically posted out. They are often characterised by one record per page and often contain items such as contact information, salutation, signature, and relevant information pulled from various records across SITS. Letter Code in Test: LESERASMUS Report Reports are lists of data. Framed header and footer regions are printed and can be populated with data such a column headers, print date and time, institution information or any other relevant text. Letter Code in Test: ASTPRIZES Multi-Column (Labels) Multi-column letter types are usually used for labels, name badges files. These types of letters print one record per label. A default label template can be specified when the SRL is created and a different label template can be specified when the SRL is run. Letter code in Test: ABSLABSPLAC Email Email SRLs define letters sent via email. These can be standard plain text emails, HTML formatted emails, and emails with attachments. Using the email letter type details screen you can define several email-only fields such as from and to addresses, cc and bcc addresses, and email subjects. Letter code in Test: ABS MBA-ACK Text File This letter type exports the data to either one combined text file or individual text files. This is often used for getting data into a third party software package such as Microsoft Excel for analysis or graphing. Letter Code in Test: ABS TXTOOLS Included Text Included Text SRLs are SRLs that are part of other SRLs. A Letter Type SRL might include another SRL of type Included Text. This allows you to nest SRLs. Note that Included Text SRLs do not generate GSLs. Letter Code in Test: CER-SCE1 HTML Document HTML Document SRLs allow you to export the SRL as an HTML document. These documents can be edited in a third party application (such as Dreamweaver) and then imported back into SITS:Vision through buttons on this letter type’s options screen. Letter Code in Test DPL01_18 Portal Intray Message Portal Intray Message letter types are delivered to the E:Vision portal’s intray. Tasks (TKT) can be attached to messages of this type. Several options are presented to the creator of a portal intray SRL including the From MST Code, a Task Code (if applicable), an MHD template, and more. Letter Code in Test: REGPTESPORT SMS Message SMS message type SRLs can be used for sending SMS (Short Message Service) text messages to mobile phones. A sender can specify which numbers to use for recipients and even a list of numbers in case one isn't defined. Letter Code in Test: ABSUG-SMSOFT Group of Letters The Standard Report Letter (SRL) type ‘Group of Letters’ is used in conjunction with the Standard Letter Link (SLL)) entity. Together they are used to allow standard letters of the same Standard Letter Group (SLG) to be linked together under a ‘Group of Letters’ SRL. Selecting this single master letter for processing will trigger the processing of all SRLs linked to the master SRL via SLL records. (None current in Test) Web Report/Letter Web Reports/Letters are used for displaying a standard letter in the e:Vision portal, via the web. A number of advanced controls are available for this type of SRL allowing you extensive customisation. Letter Code in Test: DPT-INFOUSER XML Document The SRL facility can be used for the production of XML Letters (Extensible Markup Language). It is possible to create an XML export of an entity, which can be imported into another system which previously had no other way of interpreting the data. (Very technical) Creating SRLs is Similar to a Mail Merge in Word Creating the data in the SRL is the template. The top part of the screen is used to control the letter, while the lower part contains the content of the letter, email etc. Retrieving the records in the appropriate screen (letter group associated with the SRL). Generating and Printing. LETTER GROUPS Letters are generated in the context within which they are relevant e.g. a module result letter is generated from within the Student Module Result screen (SMR), course enrolment letters are generated from within the Student Course Enrolment (SCE) record. The letter group determines where the letter can be generated from and which entities and therefore which fields can be used in the letter. STU SCE SCJ SPR SMR RDS Student Student Course Enrolment Student Course Join Student Programme Route Student Module Result Research Degree Student Using Conditional Paragraphs to Control Letter Text For example, it may be desirable to send a letter, email etc. to all students, but for the content of part of the letter to differ according to the student’s gender. (SRL Code:JOYTEST25) Lists Lists can be used to display data in list format, using sort and selection criteria to define what data is displayed, and in which order. (SRL Code: JOYTEST27) Generated Standard Letters (GSL) When a letter is generated, a record is created in the Generated Standard Letters (GSL) table. The Generated Standard Letters (GSL) table thus stores every letter that is generated and set to archive or summary. By searching this table you can view all generated letters that match a specified criteria. For example, all letters generated for a student can be viewed by specifying the student code in the Code field or you can retrieve all the standard letters that belong to a Standard Letter Group (SLG) by inserting the letter group code in the Letter group (SLG) code field. The fields on this screen allow you to be very selective about the letters you search. View Generated Standard Letters A View Generated Letters item is available from the Current menu if GSL records are present matching the currently viewed record. Prompts The standard letter facility can be set up to prompt the user for a value at the time of generation. For example, the user may need to specify a date of an exam board or a particular staff name. (AST-PGS-LTR). <<'(Prompt text)'"(Default answer text)">> <<'(Please enter the Exam Board Date:)'"(dd/mmm/yyyy)">>