Cognos 12.x

I took an existing report that prompts for: 

Company, Year, From Period, To Period, From GL Account and To GL Account (all required)

I changed the two GL Account prompts to Cascading dropdowns (Company is the parent).  All was fine.

I then used an expression to provide default values to the Year, From and To periods.  

When a user runs the report and clicks the "Finish" button, they are prompted for the From and To GL Accounts again.

No idea why?

Do you have CogBox installed? If so, on that page can you open the edit parameters screen and paste in a screenshot? It should show the active parameters at that point. 

If you don't, open the browser's developer toolbar and paste this in:
__glassAppController.glassContext.getCurrentContentView().getAuthoringApplication().GetParameterValues().map(x=>{x.value.map((y,z)=>{console.log("Parameter Name: " + x.name + " - use value " + z + ": " + y.use + " - display value: " + y.display)})})

It will show all of the active parameters. 

One idea does come to mind though, is it possible that the selected GL Accounts don't appear in the dropdowns? Or maybe the data types don't match? If the prompt is defined as a prompt alias (e.g. [Acct] >= ?pFromAcct?) there are some validations that are performed on the selected values.

------------------------------
Paul Mendelson Product Manager
Product Manager
PMsquare

Original Message:
Sent: Wed January 22, 2025 05:02 PM
From: Greg Wilburn
Subject: Getting Prompted Twice

Cognos 12.x

I took an existing report that prompts for: 

Company, Year, From Period, To Period, From GL Account and To GL Account (all required)

I changed the two GL Account prompts to Cascading dropdowns (Company is the parent).  All was fine.

I then used an expression to provide default values to the Year, From and To periods.  

When a user runs the report and clicks the "Finish" button, they are prompted for the From and To GL Accounts again.

No idea why?

------------------------------
Greg Wilburn
Director of IT
Total Biz Fulfillment
Grantsville MD
------------------------------

Cognos 12.x

I took an existing report that prompts for: 

Company, Year, From Period, To Period, From GL Account and To GL Account (all required)

I changed the two GL Account prompts to Cascading dropdowns (Company is the parent).  All was fine.

I then used an expression to provide default values to the Year, From and To periods.  

When a user runs the report and clicks the "Finish" button, they are prompted for the From and To GL Accounts again.

No idea why?

After deleting and recreating the prompts, it was working as expected.  That is until I changed the prompt text (Header Text) to blank - so the user doesn't see the parameter name.  After doing so, I am now getting prompted again for the GL Account values.

This seems like some sort of bug.  I'm new to Cognos, but I've used a lot of web development tools.  This is by far the most quirky that I've encountered.

I feel like I'm wasting a lot of time on something that should be rather simple.

Cognos 12.x

I took an existing report that prompts for: 

Company, Year, From Period, To Period, From GL Account and To GL Account (all required)

I changed the two GL Account prompts to Cascading dropdowns (Company is the parent).  All was fine.

I then used an expression to provide default values to the Year, From and To periods.  

When a user runs the report and clicks the "Finish" button, they are prompted for the From and To GL Accounts again.

No idea why?

Out of curiosity, are you using any JavaScript to select the first value? Is the user actually selecting the value?

After deleting and recreating the prompts, it was working as expected.  That is until I changed the prompt text (Header Text) to blank - so the user doesn't see the parameter name.  After doing so, I am now getting prompted again for the GL Account values.

This seems like some sort of bug.  I'm new to Cognos, but I've used a lot of web development tools.  This is by far the most quirky that I've encountered.

I feel like I'm wasting a lot of time on something that should be rather simple.

Cognos 12.x

I took an existing report that prompts for: 

Company, Year, From Period, To Period, From GL Account and To GL Account (all required)

I changed the two GL Account prompts to Cascading dropdowns (Company is the parent).  All was fine.

I then used an expression to provide default values to the Year, From and To periods.  

When a user runs the report and clicks the "Finish" button, they are prompted for the From and To GL Accounts again.

No idea why?

I am using a default value on the parameter

Out of curiosity, are you using any JavaScript to select the first value? Is the user actually selecting the value?

After deleting and recreating the prompts, it was working as expected.  That is until I changed the prompt text (Header Text) to blank - so the user doesn't see the parameter name.  After doing so, I am now getting prompted again for the GL Account values.

This seems like some sort of bug.  I'm new to Cognos, but I've used a lot of web development tools.  This is by far the most quirky that I've encountered.

I feel like I'm wasting a lot of time on something that should be rather simple.

Cognos 12.x

I took an existing report that prompts for: 

Company, Year, From Period, To Period, From GL Account and To GL Account (all required)

I changed the two GL Account prompts to Cascading dropdowns (Company is the parent).  All was fine.

I then used an expression to provide default values to the Year, From and To periods.  

When a user runs the report and clicks the "Finish" button, they are prompted for the From and To GL Accounts again.

No idea why?

Cognos 12.x

I took an existing report that prompts for: 

Company, Year, From Period, To Period, From GL Account and To GL Account (all required)

I changed the two GL Account prompts to Cascading dropdowns (Company is the parent).  All was fine.

I then used an expression to provide default values to the Year, From and To periods.  

When a user runs the report and clicks the "Finish" button, they are prompted for the From and To GL Accounts again.

No idea why?

Hello Greg, 

Check the prompt names on your prompt page matches with the names you used in the queries. Sometimes if the names are different this appears.

Thank you,

Uday. 

Cognos 12.x

I took an existing report that prompts for: 

Company, Year, From Period, To Period, From GL Account and To GL Account (all required)

I changed the two GL Account prompts to Cascading dropdowns (Company is the parent).  All was fine.

I then used an expression to provide default values to the Year, From and To periods.  

When a user runs the report and clicks the "Finish" button, they are prompted for the From and To GL Accounts again.

No idea why?

Cognos 12.x

I took an existing report that prompts for: 

Company, Year, From Period, To Period, From GL Account and To GL Account (all required)

I changed the two GL Account prompts to Cascading dropdowns (Company is the parent).  All was fine.

I then used an expression to provide default values to the Year, From and To periods.  

When a user runs the report and clicks the "Finish" button, they are prompted for the From and To GL Accounts again.

No idea why?

Hi Greg,

Did you use the new Defining default parameter values feature? I've played with this feature and I've been prompted twice in some case.

Best regards,

Cognos 12.x

I took an existing report that prompts for: 

Company, Year, From Period, To Period, From GL Account and To GL Account (all required)

I changed the two GL Account prompts to Cascading dropdowns (Company is the parent).  All was fine.

I then used an expression to provide default values to the Year, From and To periods.  

When a user runs the report and clicks the "Finish" button, they are prompted for the From and To GL Accounts again.

No idea why?