Tutorial 14: Create a User Defined Function

Result

Understand how to create a user defined function to be used in the creation of calculated measures

Tutorial steps

1. Create an Efficiency function - in the user defined section of the functions part of the Toolbox
2. Replace the custom calculation - for boiler efficiency with the newly created function
3. Re-deploy - the measure and re-confirm the results of the calculation

Functions

Select the "Tools" tab at the top of the Information Model. Expand the "Functions" folder.

Right-click on "User Defined" and click "New", "Function". Name the new function "Efficiency". Double-click on it to open its editor …

The function "Definition" is a standard Microsoft.NET C# static method. Don’t be scared of it, just type it out as shown above, or copy+paste from below:

    public static double? Efficiency(double? Actual, double? Rating)
    {
       // Standard Efficiency Calculation
       return (Actual / Rating) * 100.0;
    }
    

Click the blue "tick" button to validate the "Definition". If there are any problems, Flow will provide an error message to explain what you have done wrong.

Using a Function in a Calculated Measure

Now that you have created your own User Defined Function for calculating Efficiency, let’s go back to the Calculated Measure you created for "Production Efficiency (%)" and edit its calculation expression to rather use your new function.

Open the "Production Efficiency (%)" measure and expand the "Retrieval" section. Undeploy the measure. Delete the expression. Drag the "Efficiency" function from the "Toolbox" into the expression editor.

Select the text "double Actual" and double-click the "Production (ton/hr)" measure. Flow will replace the selected text with the measure’s name and value property. Do the same for the "double Rating" and validate your new expression.

Redeploy your Calculated Measure.