TIMESUM on period-formatted line item

gleslie

Hi Everyone,

 

I tried to use TIMESUM on a period-formatted line item and got the following error. Anaplan seems to be indicating that the formatting of both line items is a problem, but both line items are formatted the same (as the Anaplan message shows). Does anyone know why this might be happening?

 

Additional details are below:

• The ultimate goal was to create a line item that shows the first period of the model's time range that I can always reference
• I first created a month-formatted line item (called "Test GL") in a module dimensioned by time. The formula used for that line item was PERIOD(START()). 
• I then created another month-formatted line item in another module not dimensioned by time. I also called this line item "Test GL". The formula I used there was TIMESUM('SYS02 - Monthly Fiscal Calendar'.Test GL)

 

Thanks in advance for your help, and please let me know if I can provide any more information.

 

 

MarkWarren

This came up recently on something @rob_marshall looked at, maybe he'll chip in.
This error is a known issue and expected behavior.
A way to avoid it is by doing this:
PERIOD(START(TIMESUM('SYS02 - Monthly Fiscal Calendar'.Test GL)))

kevin.cho

I have come across the error before, but not exactly sure why this occurs. 

To get the start of your timescale, you can do the following though (very similar to what you were after):

 

1. Make sure you have a "Current Period" set up in your Time settings

2. Create "Line Item A", dimensioned by Time, with formula = START()

3. Create "Line Item B", no Time, with formula = TIMESUM(Line Item A, -999, 999, MIN)  (change the values here of -999 and 999 depending on your timescale length and what you set your Current Period as)

4. Create "Line Item C", no Time, with formula = PERIOD(Line Item <-- this will return the first month in your timescale

PhilippErkinger

An option would be to use a combination of PREVIOUS() and TIMESUM(). This can also be utilised to detect Switch-Over Months. 

 

gleslie

Thanks for the quick reply, Kevin! Let me try this out.

gleslie

Thanks Philipp! Let me try this, in addition to the other suggestions.

gleslie

Mark, good to know that it's a known issue - was wondering if I was doing something wrong. And thanks for your super-quick fix - it worked perfectly.