Step-by-step Text File Validation Instructions

Validating a Single File

To validate a file

1. Select one of the form types in the “Select Form to Open” 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 to validate. The list of files is filtered to show only those with the correct initial letter (see Appendix: 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 the file you want to validate and select the “Open” button.
   
   
5. When file validation is finished, you will see a message box telling you whether or not the file passed validation. If the file did not pass, you may choose 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.

Validating 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 menu item Validate – Folder.
2. You are asked whether you saved your files in the current report folder. If you answer “Yes”, the program proceeds with validation. If you answer “No”, you are shown a dialog box to select the folder that contains the report files.
3. When validation is finished, a message box informs you:
• How many files were checked
• How many of those files passed validation
• 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.)
• How many files failed validation

Only text files whose names start with one of the recognized “Prefix Letters” (P, A, M, or S) are checked. See APPENDIX A: File Naming for details about file naming conventions.

Exception reports are created for any files with either Warnings or Errors. The exception reports are stored in the same folder as the files you validated. Each 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.