Remove chosen picklist during data entry

[appleglaze28]

I'd like to ask has anyone tried deleting or removing a chosen picklist. Cause during data entry, people are bond to make mistakes like clicking the picklist and choosing an item, especially when they need to change something, or if for example they use the sandbox and they won't like to make changes that require remove all the details of an item. With static you can create a item in the picklist with nothing on it but with dimension, you're stuck with the elements int he dimension you specified in the picklist. Since clearing it doesnt work either what's the best way to handle situation like this.

[rkaif]

Using Picklist you can only select/type the data values which are the list. If you try to type another value then you will get an error message saying that your value is not valid

If you select a value from the Pick list and then later one you change/delete it from the Pick list, then in that case the value which you previously entered/selected before will remain in the cube. You have to reenter/reselect the data if you want to reflect the changes you made to the pick list

[rmackenzie]

I'd like to ask has anyone tried deleting or removing a chosen picklist. Cause during data entry, people are bond to make mistakes like clicking the picklist and choosing an item, especially when they need to change something,

Yes, I've experienced this problem recently.

IBM have accepted it as a product defect and hopefully we'll hear some news on a fix in the near future.

[jstrygner]

I did some small testing with picklists and want to share my observations.

I was doing my tests on 9.5 "March 2010 Edition" (I use this description to differentiate from "December 2009 Edition" that unfortuantely has the same official version number 9.5.0, and I did not do my testing on that one).

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First thing.

1. I acknowledge, that in static picklist you can give users an empty choice by using colons next to each other (e.g. "static::Yes:No").
2. I acknowledge that you may only choose from dimension/subset elements while creating dimension/subset picklists. In such a case I can suggest creating additional element in such a dimension/subset that is named like "_" or even ".". You can then inform users to use such a "dummy" element when they want to remove a selection made before.

But that is not everything in this topic, because...
When you copy a string (e.g. from a notepad or from a different Cube Viewer cell), select a cell that has a picklist defined and press Ctrl+V the value is inserted into cell and it does not matter if it is on a picklist list or not. It also does not matter if the picklist is defined as static, dimension or subset.
So I tried to copy an empty cell and Ctrl+V it, but in such a case I got the picklist validation message and was not able to paste, as it was not on a list. But when I copied a space (" ") and did the paste, my Cube Viewer had no problem with that and accepted it (just like any other string).

I checked if the values actually got to TM1. After recalculating the view, logging out and logging in as a new user I have no doubts. I tested it both on an ADMIN group user and a regular user that just has some WRITE rights.

As I definitely think pressing "delete" on a picklist cell should remove a selection made, I also think such a "feature" with pasting any values should be treated as a bug.
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Second thing.

While doing a TM1 training I got a question from my class if we can define a picklist for a "}Groups" dimension like "static:NONE:READ:WRITE:RESERVE:LOCK:ADMIN" so when we need to manually insert values in security control cubes we can use a list.

And the answer is:
1. You may define such a static picklist for some/all the groups elements in "}Groups" dimension.
2. Such a picklist will ONLY be available in cubes that use "}Groups" dimension, BUT their name does NOT start with "}" (not only standard control cubes will not show picklist is available, but also any cube created e.g. via TI with a "}" at the beginning).
3. Creating a Picklist Cube on cubes that start with a "}" (both standard and non standard done e.g. via TI) is not available (grayed out).
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Regards.

[Christian]

I just ran into this one too. Hopefully, they will have a fix soon.