Is there a way to change field type?

[Christina_Jarosz]

Our initial custom form was setup with many radio button questions - in reality, a drop down would be a better fit. Is there a way to change the native format? Or, a way to create a nearly identical form to carry over the data? It would make for a much better user experience.

[SkyeHa]

there's not a way to change the custom field type. I usually create the new field and have both fields on the same form for a while (the old field in an admin section that doesn't allow for overwriting) and then perform whatever cleanup is necessary to get all fields synced up and then I delete the old field. -skye

[Christina_Jarosz]

Thanks, Skye. I use these fields on reports. Is there a way to build a calculated field that combines the new field and the old field and submits whatever answer is listed?

[SkyeHa]

I really recommend that since you're eventually getting rid of the old fieldS (i.e. many of them), you would be better to make a clean start. I'm sure there's a way to do some sort of calculated field that if X is blank, look in A, B, C, D, E (however many questions you have) for the answers, but... (and how much cleanup are we talking about anyway??) I will probably leave it to someone else to give you the answer, or I recommend you get consultant time to get an answer. -skye

[CalvinFold]

Yeah I wish this was easier. During the rush of implementation I found myself with Text fields that needed to be Currency or Number, Radios that needed to be Checkbox or Menu, Single-Line that needed to be Paragraph, etc. Let's just say we were rushed and shooting from the hip is not always the best plan. I'd be interested to hear from Skye how this "clean up" would work, since I assume that means somehow transferring the values from the old field into the new field before deletion to keep reporting straight and to not lose legacy data. Kevin Quosig

[Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStore]

Hi Kevin, Cleanup pain is in the eye of the beholder, but depending on whether you have a Little, a Lot, or Tons, I'd suggest the following tactics: A Little: just do it manually, as quickly as possible, and move on A Lot: close your door, put some tunes on so you can focus, and use bulk updates where you can, and manual edits where you cannot Tons: use our "https://store.atappstore.com/product/excel-updater/">Excel Updater solution so you can efficiently edit in Excel, practice and confirm in Sandbox, and then rerun in Production Regards, Doug Doug Den Hoed - AtAppStore Got Skills? Lend a hand! https://community.workfront.com/participate/unanswered-threads

[RochelleWe]

No, Christina, I have not found a way to make that type of change without recreating the field. I usually leave the one there that I want to replace with a different format until I add the new format so that I don't forget any of the options that were available in the original format. Once I have the new format established to my satisfaction, then I delete the old fields. Dr. Rochelle L. Webb, CSM Project Manager II MHMR Tarrant County Ft. Worth, Texas 817-569-4146

[Sheri_Whitten]

Looks like this will be coming soon! Says it's Planned on the Idea Exchange >Ability to convert the field type to another field type Cheers! Sheri Whitten Gordon Food Service

[AmberDa2]

Hi Christina, We recently did something similar in that we kept an old field and created a new one to use going forward. In our report we used text mode and some nested IF statements so that the report would look at both the old and new fields and return whichever one was populated. We do not have any instances where both the old and the new would be populated. If that will be the case in your situation, you'll need to decide which one you want to return. Ours also got a little more complicated because we wanted to look at both fields as well as if it was on an issue or project. If the issue had been converted to a project, we wanted to look at the project and then return either the old or new field. If it hadn't been converted, we wanted to return the old or new issue field. Here is an example of our text mode regarding the fields Marketing Department (old) and Standard Marketing Departments (new). displayname=Marketing Department linkedname=resolveProject:Standard Marketing Departments querysort=DE:resolveProject:Standard Marketing Departments textmode=true valueexpression=IF(ISBLANK({resolveProject}.{ID}),IF(ISBLANK({DE:Marketing Department}),{DE:Standard Marketing Departments},{DE:Marketing Department}),IF(ISBLANK({resolveProject}.{DE:Marketing Department}),{resolveProject}.{DE:Standard Marketing Departments},{resolveProject}.{DE:Marketing Department})) valueformat=HTML Amber Dallapiazza The Home Depot

[Christina_Jarosz]

Hmm. Okay. So for this, if the Radio-1st "Are you submitting this on behalf of someone else" the answer would be Yes/No The replacement would be same question - just drop down. So, "Are you submitting this on behalf of someone else" - the choices being Yes/No. I could see putting both the Radio & Drop Down on the same form - but I would want a formula hierarchy that says If Radio is populated + Drop Down Empty = Give Radio Value If Radio is Empty + Drop Down Populated = Give Drop Down value or if easiest - if both populated, give Drop Down Value. It would always be an either/or situation due to the reporting needs. The data sits on the request form before it turns into a project - so I'd be happy with either result since it's the same.

[KatherineHa1]

That's great news Sheri - thanks for sharing that! Katherine Haven, PMP VP, Director, Business Technologies - PMO FCB

[CalvinFold]

Yeah, this is great news! I went over and added my 2¢ worth based on my experiences during configuration/implementation. Hoping they will consider the ability to swap between: Radio, checkbox, and dropdown menus (i.e., all value list types) Text, Number, and Currency types (i.e., string field formatting/output) Single-Line and Paragraph (i.e., string field types) Goodness knows I've had to create, recreate, fix, tweak, and swear-at fixes like these as people change their minds or I make mistakes. Kevin Quosig

[joshh79242137]

Hey there. Glad to see some excitement around this. While I don't have an announced timeline yet, it's definitely in the plans. Something to just put out there as to how it would likely work. The changes will likely be allowed between similar types. This would mean that single select fields can convert to other single selects and multi-selects. Multi-select fields can convert to other multi-select fields. We can't really convert from a multi-select field to a single select field, for data consistency. If you have a checkbox field, and 3 options are selected, then later want to convert it to a radio button field (which only allows one), which 2 of the 3 options should we remove from the stored data? I'm looking forward to delivering this in the near future and getting your feedback as we do so. Josh Hardman Product Manager, Workfront