Converting a list to another list
Hi everyone,
I recently discovered something within Anaplan that has made my life a lot easier when uploading data. For reference, I work at a mid-size firm and we have data that comes from our accounting software, and data that comes from our enterprise reporting software. Sometimes the naming conventions of things are different and I discovered a method of allowing them to fall under the same list.
For example let's say we have Building A in our accounting software, and Bldng. A in our enterprise reporting software. The first step is to create a new list for whichever direction you are trying to convert, for this example we are converting from "Bldng. A" to "Building A".
The list should contain the code for Building A as the name or line item, while the code should be the naming convention you want to get rid of (for this example Bldng. A).
After this is done, you can create 3 line items in your data module.
1. Conversion: this line item should be formatted with the same list shown above, and should use the formula FINDITEM("List Above", Data being converted). This will return the code you need.
2. NameLine: NAME(Conversion) this will convert the above code to text, that way the next line item can recognize it.
3. Final FINDITEM: this list should be formatted with the end goal list, and should use the formula FINDITEM("End Goal List", NameLine).
Once this is done you are now able to use the 3rd line item to sum off the data and have it be in the same hierarchy/list as all of your other data. I hope this helps someone as it has saved me a ton of time converting abbreviations, codes, etc to the same format.
Answers
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This seems a good workaround. But following a unique naming convention across systems will make this lot more manageable. This will make the data imports easy and save you extra effort.
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I agree - unfortunately through acquisitions and such sometimes naming conventions do not stay consistent. For example if you have a building in Chicago and the company you acquire also has one, they may both be coded as CHI (a similar case to what happened and why I had to use this methodology).
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