How to create a simple to-do app?

If you do not have any experience with the Softools platform do not fret as this post will go through the basics of creating a new app. This includes an introduction to the quick app generator, record securities and reports. For this to-do app, it will include five fields being a title, target date, type, status, and a description.

Creating an app

First you would need to access the AppStudio to make any changes to the site. It can be found be clicking on the gear icon and onto the AppStudio. If you do not find this option please contact the site admin about this as under your account permissions you do not have access to AppStudio.

Once you have entered AppStudio you should find a collection of the apps on the ‘My Apps’ form and at the bottom you will find a blue ‘Add’ button to click onto.

It should now open the pop-up box bellow in which I would recommend creating a blank app.

From this page you should now fill in with the details for the to-do list such as the title, description, record names and the default language and click onto ‘Save’.

Now comes to uploading an Icon for the app, which you can find on the ‘Icon’ template. To upload the a new icon click onto the ‘Upload New’ button and which will open up a window to allow you to upload your icon.

Setting Record Securities

To change the record securities, click onto the ‘Security’ form where you will find three templates called App Visibility, Default Record Access Right and App Edit Access Rights.

From this form you can change the securities to the access you would like for our app which you can read more about here. But more importantly toggle the App Visibility off for it to be visible then onto ‘Save’.

Adding the fields

Now comes to adding the five fields mentioned in the brief at the start of the post which you would need to click onto the ‘Fields’ form and to create a new field click onto ‘Add’ at the bottom, which will open a page for the different field types to select.

For the title field select onto the Text field and name it Title and toggle the ‘Is Title Field’ on.

For the date field name find the date field and label it ‘Target Date’.

The configuration for the type field is slightly different as it would require to set up the list first before selecting the ‘Selection’ field. To do this go back onto the homepage for AppStudio and onto the ‘Select Lists’ form click onto ‘Add’ and fill the options with all the type list you would like to add.

Now to create the field select the ‘Selection’ field with the label and select ‘Type’ under Select List, then Select for List type then text for list sub type.

The process to create the Status field is similar to the process in creatin the Type field by selecting ‘Image Lists’ in the AppStudio homepage and click onto ‘Add’. Then by clicking onto the ‘Add Option’ buttons you can upload a ticket and unticked options to indicate the completed of a to do list.

Back onto the to-do list app create a new field and select the Image list option with the Image list you have just created.

Lastly, comes the description field which I would recommend selecting the ‘Long Text’ field as it allows the users to record more texts then a normal ‘Text’ field.

Creating the Template

Once the fields have been created, next comes the templates which are used to structure the on-screen appearance of the data input fields. For the creation of the template click onto the ‘Templates’ form and the ‘Add’ button. Then add the title for the template and I would recommend adding some help text to help the users navigate the template.

Then to structure the template click onto the ‘Design Template’ button which will open up a menu to drag the fields into the boxes, I would recommend to toggle Span on for the description field to allow it to fill out the whole row.

Creating the Form

Forms provide a natural grouping and layout for Templates, often reflecting the stages or phases of the process being followed. Each Form contains at least one or more Template. To create a new Form select the ‘Forms’ form and click onto the blue ‘Add’ button and add the title of the form, and add the newly created template in the Form Templates template.

Creating the Report

Once a record has been created you might want to display summary information of the Fields in a simple list format. A list report would also allow you to more data, or click on any row to drill down into the Record. To create a report select the Reports form and find the List report from the selection of the report types.

When you have entered the configuration page fill in the Title field and toggle ‘Is Default?’ on so it will always select this report to represent the records. Then to add the information you want to add for the list report to summarise find the ‘Report Fields’ template and click onto the blue ‘Add’ button then the ‘Add Report Field’ and add the fields you want to be displayed.

Once all the steps are completed, you can now go back into your site which you should now find your newly created to-do app with all the new fields, templates, forms and reports you have just created.

Network Report (Optional)

Another report you could add to your to-do lists is a network report. A network report provides a fantastic visual aid, especially with projects with wider scopes, which you can read more about it here. Furthermore, we will add a multi-state RAG field for the priority of the tasks, where Red is urgent and Green is less urgent.

Like you have done with the previous fields, you simply have to add a new field of type Multi-state and select RAG as its sub-type then add it to the Tasks template.

Now comes for the creation of the network report, which is done by selecting the Network chart as the chart type.

An additional function to this chart I will add is by creating a base filter to only show the records which have been unticked as those tasks has not been completed. So instead it will only show the open tasks which is done by adding the following expression in the Base Filter box.

$filter=[Status] eq 'Unticked'

Below that box is the Target Click Through Report box which I would recommend adding the report you have previously created To Do Log. This allows users to click onto a record in the report and will take them to the following report. 

Finally comes adding the chart fields which are used to display information about the records in the charts. The first chart field to add is the Title field which will display the titles of the report in the charts. Select Level as the Chart Field Type and add the Title field in the Field box with the label 'Title'.

Then the other chart field will be the Colour Chart Field Type which will be used to display the colour of the priority if the tasks. Once Colour is selected as the Chart field type and Priority is selected as the field with the label 'Priority' and the report is saved the report should now be finished.

By going back to the site under the new report you should now see the following report you have just created.