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There are two ways to validate your report files, by the file or by the folder.  Only text files can be validated. Files are checked for compliance with the PRL Text File Specifications. The specifications are also available on the Help menu under File Format Guidelines.

To Validate a Single File

Validating a Single File

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1. Select one of the form types in the “Select Form to Open” Report Forms frame.
   
   
2. Select the “Validate File” button (or the menu item Validate –> File).
   
   

3. You will be prompted with a standard Windows dialog box to select a file from the report folder to validate.

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   Note The list of files displayed is filtered to show only those with the correct initial letter (see

   Appendix:

   Report File Naming).

    Although you can change which files are shown by picking another entry in the “Files of type” drop down list, files whose names have the wrong initial letter will fail validation.
   
4. Pick Either pick the file you want to validate or navigate to the folder containing the file you want to validate and select the “Open” Open button.
   1. For larger files a dialog with a progress bar and an estimate of the time remaining for the validation run will display.  This dialog also contains a Stop button.
      
      

5. When file validation is finished, you will see a message box

   telling you whether or not the file passed validation.

   containing the validation result and some other information.

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   Scroll office title title Validation Result Image Added

6. If the file did not pass or there were warnings, you may choose have the option to open the exception report.

The exception report is created only if there are problems with the file. You may view the exception report at any time, although it will be overwritten the next time you validate that file. The exception report is stored in the same folder as the file you validated. The exception file’s name is “exception_” followed by the name of the file that was validated. For example, the exception report for file A01234.txt is named exception_A01234.txt.

1. Regardless of the outcome, you can open the file in the editor.  If there are errors, a small dialog will show the number of errors before the editor opens.  Any cells with validation errors will display with a pink background.
   
   1. If you do open the file in the editor, you can fix the errors and save the file just like you would with a file created with Option A.  Alternatively you can fix the errors in the software you used to create it with the assistance of the exception report.

 

To Validate

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a Report Folder

You may validate all of the PRL report files in a single folder in a single operation, instead of selecting each file individually.

1. Select the Validate Folder button (or the menu item Validate – –> Folder).
   
   
2. You are asked whether you saved your files in the current report folder. If you answer “Yes” Yes, the program proceeds with validation. If you answer “No” No, you are shown a dialog box to select the folder that contains the report files.
   1. If the validation run will take more than a second, a dialog with a progress bar and an estimate of the time remaining will display.  This dialog also contains a Stop button.
      
      
3. When validation is finished, a message box informs you:
   
   
   1. How many files were checked.
   2. How many of those files passed validation.
   3. How many files
have warnings (“Warnings” are minor issues that should be corrected but are not serious enough to cause the file to fail validation.)
4. 1. had warnings.
   2. How many files failed validation

...

1. 1. .
      
      
2. Exception reports are created for any files with either Warnings or Errors

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1. and will be located in the

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1. folder

...

1. you validated.
   
   

Keystroke Shortcuts

• Validate File: Alt-V, F or Alt-V
• Validate Folder: Alt-V, D