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  • 1.  Archiving Paste Equipment Data

    Posted 10-22-2019 22:58
    Hi all,

    I'm thinking of archiving all past equipment and just wondering if anybody have any better suggestions as to what i'm thinking.

    1. Creating a duplicate App, then setting up automation to purge/transfer data from the current App to the copied App. (either via automation / 3rd party app like Zapier)

    - what happens when there are field changes/new tabs in the future to the current App? do i then have to do extra work by editing both Apps?

    - additionally, i'm afraid it might affect some of the data on the current App. etc. total operation hours, # of times used, because these numbers are based on a [Summary] field, is there a way to prevent that?

    Would appreciate any feedback.

    Thanks.

    Regards,
    Samuel

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    Samuel Goh
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  • 2.  RE: Archiving Paste Equipment Data

    Posted 10-22-2019 23:28
    HI Samual,

    Why would you waste another app just to keep archived data and burry the performance of other apps.  The best practice is to agree and set the retention period for your data as QB limits only 500mb data per table.  Take a dump in csv or use the database like (SQL, MYSQL Server) to keep a archive. If you have db sitting on cloud, you can quickly get the data archive using zapier or workato. If you want to do it offline, use the QuNect connector by which you can archive on sql server. It also comes with QuNect backup utility which archives the whole app or report based data including file attachments.

    Hope this helps.

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    Babi Panjikar
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  • 3.  RE: Archiving Paste Equipment Data

    Posted 10-23-2019 07:58
    Samuel,

    Archiving data is a huge problem in lots of systems, not just Quick Base.   We built a tool to get data out of Quick Base and into a SQL Compliant DB called Paasporter. 

    www.paasporter.com

    That maintains all the relationships and fully indexs the data.   Now you can use storage designed for larger data sets and write SQL queries that reveal all sorts of information that Quick Base cannot show you.

    If you would like a demo, please let me know.

    Don
    Don@paasporter.com



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    Don Larson
    Paasporter
    Westlake OH
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  • 4.  RE: Archiving Paste Equipment Data

    Posted 10-23-2019 10:25
    Hi Samuel,

    To your question on archiving data effecting things like total operation hours, # of times used, etc. There are a few techniques that can help with that. With your summary field you can also do an archived value field and when you archive data you can adjust that manual entry archive value field to match the total operation hours you archived. Then you can make a formula field to add your current summarized values and the manually entered total value of archived data to get the overall total of live data and archived data if you still need to report off of it. Someone would just need to update those numbers anytime you ​archive out more records. That or you would want to make sure you pass on that the summarized values only reflect records that are live and not those that are archived.

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    Evan Martinez
    Community Marketing Manager
    Quick Base
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  • 5.  RE: Archiving Paste Equipment Data

    Posted 10-23-2019 10:47
    Edited by Evan Westbrook 10-23-2019 10:49
    Samuel,

    Just another idea to add the many great suggestions already listed:

    Data Warehousing
    You may want to try archiving your data in the form of a data warehouse. You can think of a data warehouse as a big Excel pivot table for a chunk of similar operations data. The summary values in this pivot table are saved in a non-linked format for historic reporting instead of keeping track of years' worth of operations data and performing calculations on the data each time a report is generated. In addition to reporting speed, this is particularly handy when you want to use a new field to track a metric or update the way it's calculated. You wouldn't have to wrangle legacy data or look through archived .csv files because the value you want is already calculated and saved in your data warehouse. Data warehousing also gives you an opportunity to remove any bad data from metric calculations.

    Example:
    You would need to identify the business metric needs for the data being archived and relevant summary time frames. For you, these relevant business metrics seem to be total operation hours and usage frequency for a piece of equipment. Many companies data warehouse based on month or week. With your data warehouse, if the CEO asked, "what are the trends for total operations hours on equipment by month for the past 10 years filterable by individual piece of equipment," you could answer the question even though you might only have the last 6 months of data stored in your operations tables! If you want to continue a running total of operations hours in your operations tables, you could related the "data warehouse" table to the operations table and keep using the summary field.

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    Evan Westbrook
    PRIME Developer
    Harder Mechanical Contractors Inc.
    Portland OR
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  • 6.  RE: Archiving Paste Equipment Data

    Posted 10-30-2019 02:53
    Hi all,

    Many thanks for the great suggestions.

    I now have a better idea and comprehension of how i'm going to work around archiving all the data that might still be relevant without affecting the main app. It might be slightly tedious but i guess it'll work out fine after the initial set-up of the automation/trigger.

    Once again, thank you all for your inputs!

    Regards,
    Samuel

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    Samuel Goh
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