What do I need to know about Custom Fields?

Custom Field Fundamentals

You can create Custom Fields in many areas of SOLAR in order to customise each feature to better meet your school's needs.

However you need to be aware that if you have created a custom field and then entered data into it you should NOT delete the field if you decide you  no longer wish to use it. You can rename the custom field e.g. No longer in use. This is because if you delete the field from your SOLAR the data remains in the database and can cause the feature to no longer work and/or display error messages.

It is recommended that if you are using custom fields in one of SOLAR's many features that you plan what you want on paper before making the changes to SOLAR as continually adding and deleting custom fields can cause errors to occur.  Do not use "special characters" in custom fields and we recommend that you keep the number of characters/words in check boxes and drop-downs to a minimum.

Custom fields must not be given the same name as any of the standard fields already on SOLAR.