Is it possible to directly edit the autocomplete lists so that obsolete suppliers, clients, payees etc can be removed from the system completely? Everytime I type in the payee in spend money, it shows suppliers that are long inactive! Thanks
There is no way to edit the autocomplete list currently. It shows up to five possibilities that match what has been typed so far. Type a couple more letters, and the list narrows quickly. And who is to say you might not be entering an inactive customer or supplier for some reason? I suspect this is not unique Manager code, but a feature of the browser engine it’s built on.
Its a pity, because I would like to get rid of some suppliers that I won’t be using again. Its irritating that, although a minor issue.
You could try the Inactive option. Just select the supplier you don’t wanna do business with anymore without deleting the supplier and check the Inactive option.
They are already inactive. This has no effect on the autocomplete history.
I just tired it and they didn’t show up on my system. Are you using the latest version of Manager maybe it was a bug on old version and they fixed it.
Current version 16.12.42
Edit: Sorry i just recheck it yes they still show up i think its a bug !!
This must be erratic, I don’t get nor can I make any of the inactive Customer / Suppliers to appear in any of the autocomplete dropdowns, but did find a separate issue.
Maybe it depends on where you go in the program. I am having the issue when I go to cash accounts, spend money and then when I type in the payee field I am getting suppliers that have long since been made inactive! Its not the drop downs that I am having the issue.
That’s exactly where I don’t get the issue, no inactive are displayed. Can’t screenshot it as that dropdown closes as soon as I try, whereas most dropdowns don’t close.
As a workaround, rename the inactive with a “z” in front, this should shift them to the bottom of the pile assuming alphabetically is functioning here
As best I can tell, there are two autocomplete functions at work in different parts of the program:
When you create an invoice, order, or other form linked to a customer or supplier, the autocomplete list offers up to 9 entries matching what has been typed so far in the entry field. Inactive customers/suppliers are not shown.
When you create a form that is not linked to a customer/supplier, such as a payment or receipt, the Payee field shows up to 5 options that have been entered before. Active/inactive status has no effect, because the program is not calling the list of customers/suppliers. And @Brucanna’s idea of editing names so they appear further down in the list does not work, because the program is not calling the customer/supplier lists.
While this behavior may seem irritating, it is logical. And as far as my tests have shown, it is consistent.
Having looked at the matter again, I concur with @Tut that there may be two autocomplete functions at work in the program.
I have tested the payee field and I can confirm that it is definitely picking up the list of suppliers. I have typed the letters for random suppliers in and they show up after two letters typed in. I suspect that what is happening with the payee field on spend money is that it is not honouring the inactive field as entries to ignore unlike other autocomplete lists. I have tested this by renaming one of the inactive suppliers and it still shows the inactive supplier in the list thus demonstrating that this is not a previously typed history list.
Perhaps the issue has been fixed in the most recent version as I am on version 16.10.86 as I have not had time to design custom themes for invoices etc, so never got around to upgrading.
I will upgrade on my laptop tomorrow and see if I can still replicate the issue.
I don’t think their is an issue to fix, as the two autocomplete functions operate independently as you noted, therefore, unless the inactive feature is extended to include the Payer/Payee autocomplete - they shall remain.
Upon further testing it appears that there is a connection between the two autocomplete lists.
If you create a new Supplier, they will appear in the Spend Money Payee dropdown.
If you then make that Supplier inactive, they will disappear from the Spend Money Payee dropdown.
So the inactive works on all dropdowns up to this point.
But once you make an actual payment to that Supplier they remain as a residual Payee, even if you subsequently make them inactive.
Now for the oddity, if you are paying a Supplier and you leave the Payee field blank and then make them inactive, they will be removed from the Payee dropdown.
So the only purpose of putting a Supplier in the Payee field is for documentation purposes, not accounting purposes.
So @dalacor, for those suppliers who you want to make disappear, you can go back and remove their names from the Payee field for all their payments, then they will no longer appear in the dropdown
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I think what your testing shows, @Brucanna, is that both autocomplete functions work on the payee/payer fields. This lets you take advantage of the customer/supplier lists even if recording cash transactions. And you have the payee/payer lists for transactions with others. @dalacor’s frustration comes because the program doesn’t know the difference. Nor could it. Nor should it, because you might be entering someone who happens to have the same name as an inactive customer/supplier.
I think that @lubos will want to fix this anyway as you do not ever want a name that is a duplicate of another supplier. So the field should prevent duplicates and should remove histories of inactive suppliers. When he is back from Christmas he can look at that. I even tried highlighting the old entry and selecting delete on my keyboard - that works in Outlook and IE but unfortunately not in Manager and I suspect because its not a history entry, but drawing up the suppliers regardless of their active state.
I disagree on this one, @dalacor. I can understand your desire that an inactive supplier not appear automatically, although I don’t support the idea. But why should the program prevent you from entering anyone you want as a payee? Suppose you bought computer parts from a supplier named Robert Smythe, doing business under his own name. He goes out of business, so you move him to inactive status. But you now try to buy a used laptop as a cash purchase from a different person who happens to have the same name. Should the program prevent that? I don’t think so.
I did not say that the program must be prevented from entering anyone I want as payee - I don’t actually want that as I pay myself money and I am not a supplier to the business - so I do want to be able to manually enter a payee! That has nothing to do with removing inactive suppliers which is the only thing that I need and as for your suggestion that the program should allow duplicate names - that is a terrible idea. It may work for a one man company but does not work if you have a team of staff doing the accounts - duplicate names would cause so many problems.
I don’t see why it matters how many people work on accounting tasks. In fact, the bigger a company gets, the more customers it will generally have. The odds of duplicate names grow ever larger. Yes, you may need customer codes to tell some of them apart, but the program allows those. But what would you do in your business if you had two customers who wanted to contract for monthly network maintenance? Suppose Dr. Jones the dermatologist hires you to support his office systems, then Dr. Jones the surgeon wants similar support. Surely you would not turn one away because of a shared name. And what would you do if the dermatologist retires and is made inactive? Would you want the surgeon to stop appearing as a selection option?