Why Is My Cell Not Inputable / Annotatable?

Symptom

When designing an input Form, a common issue that you may come across is that the cells which are supposed to be input-enabled are not. You can right-click into the Cell Details to investigate this issue.

 

 

There are three sections in the Cell Details window: Misc, State, and Slice. The State and Slice sections will help us identify the cause that prevents a cell from being inputable.

 

 

 

Is Lowest

Whether all of the dimension members that define the cell are at the lowest level of their hierarchy.

 

If the value is False, you need to check the detailed information in Slice section:

 

• If any of the slice’s values is 0, this means that dimension has not been set to any member that has a MemberId. It might have been set [All], or an attribute member in a leveled Hierarchy. To make the cell inputable, change the dimension value to a member with a MemberId.

 

• If any of the slice’s values is -1, this means the None member of that dimension has been selected. When we create a medium or large size dimension, a None member will be automatically added to the dimension. This None member’s MemberId is -1. To make the cell inputable, change the dimension value to a valid member with a MemberId.

 

• If all slice values are positive integers, it means at least one of the dimensions is not the leaf member of its hierarchy. The value of this cell should be aggregated from its leaf members. If you still want the cell to be inputable, you may have to change your dimension structure.

 

 

Is Writable

Whether the user has the Write permission to the Model /Dimension or not.

 

If the value is False and the user is supposed to have the permission to write, navigate to the ADMINISTRATOR module and grant Write permission to the user or the Group/Role they belong to.

 

 

 

Is Input

Whether the Input property of all the dimension members that define the cell have been set to True.

 

 If the value is False, please check the Dimension Members’ Input property values.

 

 

If all Dimension Members have Input set to True but the cell is still not input-enabled, then check the Manage Cell Attribute section within the Form. In the ATTRIBUTES tab within the cell attributes window, the cell input attribute can be overridden. Ensure Disallow is not selected by mistake here.

 

 

 

Is Locked

Whether the plan is locked or not.

 

If the value is True, there are two settings you may need to check.

• The Lock property of the Plan in the ADMINISTRATOR module:

 

 

• If you are working in a Dashboard, check the Read-Only property of the Form:

 

 

In conclusion, only when the values for Is Lowest, Is Writeable, Is Input, and Is Locked are True, True, True, and False, respectively, will a cell be inputable.

 

 

Is Annotate

A cell is annotated when at least one of the Dimension Members that define the cell is annotate-enabled. This means the Annotate property of the Dimension Member is true.

 

 

You can also check the Cell Details to see why a cell is not annotate-enabled. Similar to the input settings, only when the values for Is Lowest, Is Writeable, Is Annotate, and Is Locked are True, True, True, and False, respectively, will a cell be annotatable.

 

 

To allow users save the annotation content into the database, you have to check the Query includes annotation and text cells option under Advanced Settings. Otherwise, when users post the plan, all annotation contents will be removed.

 

Note: Annotation can only be saved to the Writeback partition. If there are cases where you need to insert comment into the cells in Rules (for example, alert messages) you have to insert the annotation into Writeback partition.