Contact Information DATs

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Using the *contact_info data access tag (DAT) you can add certain contact information to Object Reports, Report Cards, Mailing Labels, and Form Letters by formatting various expressions. DATs can also be used on your own custom pages, and to export data through traditional export tools such as Quick Export and AutoSend.

Before Getting Started

The *contact_info DAT is always run from the student's perspective.
The DAT starts with a list of contacts for each student, ordered based on the priority order than can be seen on the Students Contact page.
Each contact can have a number of addresses, emails, or phone numbers that are sorted in ascending priority order for each category. These contact items have attributes such as "Type" than can be used to filter the list.
The items in the remaining filtered list are assigned a temporary index for reference within the DAT. For example, when a contact has 2 phones with type "Home" and 2 phones with type "Work", if the DAT has filtered to only Home phones then then index 2 will reference the second "Home" phone even if it started out as the 3rd phone number in the unfiltered list.
If an expression resolves to nothing, an empty string is returned. For example, a request to display the 3rd Home phone in a list of 2.
If an expression is not allowed to return a field due to the user's Field Level Security role restrictions, a string of five asterisks is returned (*****).
It is possible for historical and future relationship detail records to exist between a single contact and student. Only one relationship detail record can be active on any given day. The *contact_info DAT only considers the relationship detail record that is active on the day the DAT is used.
If an argument resolves to nothing, such as asking for the (non-existent) step-god father relationship, or an index 10 of a list of 3, nothing (an empty string) is returned.

Syntax

The following outlines the general forms for calling the *contact_info DAT in different areas of PowerSchool:

Area	Form
Arguments	Separated by semicolon
Dates	date:MM/dd/yyyy
form on WEB page	~(*contact_info[;...])
form on Object Report	^(contact_info[;...]) ~(contact_info[;...])
form in Quick Export	^(contact_info[;...]) ~(contact_info[;...])
from Student Fields:	*contact_info[;...]
Keywords	Separate from their arguments by an equal sign

Default (No Arguments Form)

For the quickest results in calling the *contact_info DAT in PowerSchool, use ~(*contact_info). Doing so, returns the student's first contact's prefix, first name, middle name, last name, and suffix, , such as Dr. Herman Webster Mudgett Sr..

Grammar

Workflow Overview

Determine who to include:

Start with all contacts for a student.
Filter by active contact details relationship description if the relationship code type is "relationship."
Filter by relationship flags.
Filter by asof-person.
Filter by active contact details relationship display value.
Sort the remaining contact by priority order.
Truncate list at max persons.
Evaluate which person (index into the current list).

Determine what to include:

Process the contact by category, extracting field values.
Categories are processed in this order:
- Demographics
- Relationship
- Phone
- Email
- Address

Who to Include

Queries are from the context of the currently selected student. From there, the contact list is narrowed down using the following predicates:

rel (Relationship)

What	Filter contacts by relationship to the student.
Keyword	rel
Default	all
Values	all, or a comma-separated list of relationship type codes, such as mother, father, etc.
Notes	List order is not preserved. Contacts are ordered by priority, not relationship type.
Examples	~(*contact_info;rel=all)

flags (Relationship Flags)

What	Filter contacts by relationship to the student.
Keyword	Flags
Default	none (the default behavior is to show only active contacts
Values	Comma-separated list of: include-inactive only-inactive custodial non-custodial emergency non-emergency lives-with not-lives-with school-pickup not-school-pickup receives-mail not-receives-mail dataaccess not-dataaccess webaccount (WAA - as of PS 12.1.3.0) not-webaccount (WAA - as of PS 12.1.3.0)
Examples	~(*contact_info;flags=include-inactive)

asof-pers (As Of Person)

What	Filter the list of contacts associated with the student to those valid at a particular time.
Keyword	asof-pers
Default	current (today)
Values	date, or comma-separated list of past, current, future, active, all
Notes	A date is specified as date:MM/dd/yyyy. A value of current includes todays active contacts where today falls between (inclusive). A value of past includes yesterday's active contacts only; cannot have a start or end date after today. A value of future includes tomorrows active contacts only, cannot have a start or end date before today. A value of active includes contact with contact details closest to today's date. There can only be one active contact. Active contacts should not be confused with activating a contact.
Examples	~(contact_info;asof-pers=current) ~(contact_info;asof-pers=current,past,future) ~(*contact_info;asof-pers=date:03/30/2017)

max-pers (Max Persons)

What	Limit the number of contacts in the report.
Keyword	max-pers
Default	1
Values	all, or number indicating how many people to include
Notes	This is specified as a one based index.
Examples	~(*contact_info;max-pers=1)

which-pers (Which Person)

What	Extract a contact from the list of contacts associated with a student.
Keyword	which-pers
Default	All
Values	all, or number indicating which index in the list
Notes	which-pers is evaluated after max-pers and sorting by priority order
Examples	~(*contact_info;which-person=all)

What Data to Include

cat (Category)

What	Determines which categories of contact data to include.
Keyword	Cat
Default	Dem
Values	all, or comma-separated list of rel, demo, phone, email, addr
Notes	Categories are processed in the following order: dem, rel, phone, email, addr. If an unrecognized category is passed, PowerSchool defaults to dem (demographics).

which-val (Which Value)

What	Extract an item from the list of items.
Keyword	which-val
Default	1
Values	all, or number indicating which index in the list
Notes	This setting is applied across categories. This is specified as a one based index.
Examples	~(*contact_info;which-val=1)

type

What	Filter output to include only the specified types of data.
Keyword	Type
Default	All
Values	all, or comma-separated list of any valid type code for the selected categories
Notes	This setting is applied across categories. If present, any category that accepts type filtering will be filtered by this parameter.
Examples	~(*contact_info;type=all)

asof-val (As Of Value)

What	Filter output to items valid at a particular time.
Keyword	asof-val
Default	Current
Values	date, or comma-separated list of past, current, future, all
Notes	This setting is only supported for addresses (not email or phone number). A date is specified as date:MM/dd/yyyy.
Examples	~(contact_info;as-of=current) ~(contact_info;as-of=date:12/31/2017)

val (Value)

What	Values from a category to report.
Keyword	Val
Default	All
Values	all, or comma-separated list of object fields: Demographics: acctemail (WAA account email - as of PS 12.1.3.0) acctid (WAA accountId - as of PS 12.1.3.0) active employer firstname gender language lastfirst (lastName, firstName middleName) lastname middlename personid (as of PS 12.1.3.0) prefix stateid statenum suffix Relationship: active custody dataaccess emergency enddate liveswith receivesmail relationship schoolpickup srexcluded startdate Address: city country enddate line2 startdate stateprovince street type unit postalcode Phone: phone preferred sms type Email: email primary type
Examples	~(*contact_info;val=all)

Display/Format Options

Delimiters

Delimiters are used to offset different pieces of data from one another. Two commonly used delimiters include:

comma (, )	A comma followed by a space. Useful in comma delimiting reports.
barecomma (,)	A comma with no padding. Useful in comma delimiting exports.

contact-delim (Contact Delimiter)

What	Specifies the delimiter to use between multiple contacts.
Keyword	contact-delim
Default	Dlf
Values	dlf (double line-feed) lf (line-feed) p (HTML paragraph: <p>) br (HTML break: <br>) comma (, ) barecomma (,) semicolon (;) space ( ) pipe (\|)
Notes	Reports do not honor lf or dlf; use p or br instead.
Examples	~(*contact_info;contact-delim=dlf)

item-delim (Item Delimiter)

What	Specifies the delimiter to use between multiples of the same item, such as multiple phones, multiple addresses, etc.
Keyword	item-delim
Default	Comma
Values	dlf (double line-feed) lf (line-feed) p (HTML paragraph: <p>) br (HTML break: <br>) comma (, ) barecomma (,) semicolon (;) space ( ) pipe (\|)
Notes	Reports do not honor lf or dlf; use p or br instead.
Examples	~(*contact_info;item-delim=comma)

value-delim (Value Delimiter)

What	Specifies the delimiter to use between multiple values specified by the value parameter.
Keyword	value-delim
Default	Space
Values	dlf (double line-feed) lf (line-feed) p (HTML paragraph: <p>) br (HTML break: <br>) comma (, ) barecomma (,) semicolon (;) space ( ) pipe (\|)
Notes	Reports do not honor lf or dlf; use p or br instead.
Examples	~(*contact_info;value-delim=lf)

cat-delim (Category Delimiter)

What	Specifies the delimiter to use between multiple categories, such as demographics, email, etc.
Keyword	cat-delim
Default	Lf
Values	dlf (double line-feed) lf (line-feed) p (HTML paragraph: <p>) br (HTML break: <br>) comma (, ) barecomma (,) semicolon (;) space ( ) pipe (\|)
Notes	Reports do not honor lf or dlf; use p or br instead.
Examples	~(*contact_info;contact-delim=dlf)Â

Localization

locale

What	Specifies the locale to use when decoding dates.
Keyword	Locale
Default	en_US
Values	Valid locale code, such as el_GR
Notes	Date strings used in DAT arguments are always entered in MM/dd/YYYY format. Only the return value is localized.
Examples	~(*contact_info;locale=en_US)