In Phocas, period types define the core increments of time that allow users to analyse their data, forming the basis of defined periods. There are three default period types: Months, Days and Years.
Administrators with the 'period types' profile option ticked can add other period types such as Quarters or Weeks. If you have this permission you can set a new period type by manually entering the date ranges you require or importing a file containing the start and end dates for each period. You can also add a period type based on synced data.
Manually add date ranges
Step 1: Select Administration > Period types.
Step 2: Choose New, name the new period type (in this example Quarter) and Save.
This new period type will appear in the list.
Step 3: Now you'll need to define each moment of your new period type. To do this, select the period type you just created and choose Add. In the dialog that opens, enter a name, and the required date range and Save. In this example, we've repeated this step 4 times for each of our 4 quarters, as shown below.
| Quarter 1 | Quarter 2 | Quarter 3 | Quarter 4 |
|---|---|---|---|
 |  |  |  |
Step 4: Once complete, you can review all your moments in a list, as shown. This period type will now be available in the date dropdown in the Designer tool.
Note that you can not enter dates that overlap with an existing period type. If you try to do this, you will see a warning, allowing you to adjust your dates.
Import a file containing dates for new period type
Step 1: Select Administration > Period types.
Step 2: Choose New, name the new period type (in this example, Weeks) and Save. This new period type will appear in the list.
Step 3: Upload the file that contains details of your new period type. To do this, select the period type you just created and then choose Import. You can download the file used in this example here; it is similar to the screen shot below.
Step 4: Set the date format to match that of the imported file (for the screen shot above we'll need to choose dd/mm/yyyy) and Upload.
Important note about file format
- The file must be a .txt file with the columns Name, Start Date, End Date and Year in that order with no headings, as per the image below.
- The Name must be unique. Although in reality there might be a Week 1 every year, you'll need to name your moments individually. For example, Wk1-2016, Wk1-2017, etc.
- Data in the Year column must be 4 numbers only. If your moment spans a change in year, it is recommended to choose the year that matches the Start Date.
Select new period type in Designer
Once you have created a new period type, it becomes available for selection in the Designer tool.