Since the introduction of the Approval system in version 9, the approval ID has been used for approval numbering. The approval ID is unique across each database, meaning if you have a project that is assigned approval id 1125, another project may well raise the next two IDs (1126 and 1127), and then your next number would be 1128. This works perfectly well, and conceptually there is no need for the approval numbers to be consecutive – just unique. This is why this design decision was made in the first place. It is easier, and technically more robust.

But human beings can be funny creatures, and several users have reported clients who take issue with their approval numbers not being consecutive. Given that this has happened more than once with some users, we have made the decision to implement project specific numbering.

The new behaviour is that each approval will get the next consecutive number in the context of the project, not the database. In the example above, after creating ID 1125, the next number for the project would be 1126, regardless of what other projects in the system were doing. This is more complicated, and more things can go wrong – e.g. what is called a race condition when more than one user on a project needs a new approval number, but this essentially works the same as numbers for NCRs and Test Requests.

How does this affect existing Approval Numbers?

Existing approvals in the system will not be renumbered. The upgrade to v 10.65.xx will copy the existing ID to the new Approval Number field. You should notice no difference.

What happens if I need to change the Number?

In the approval view form, you can invoke the “Allow Editing Protected” option that will allow you to type a new approval number. The only requirement is that the approval number is unique. Be careful though, because if you put a new approval number that is the largest number for the project, then this will be the new starting point for the automatic numbering. E.g. if your largest approval number is 25, and you change a number to be 1000, the next approval number automatically generated will be 1001.

What if I don’t get an approval number?

The system should always give you an approval number automatically. Just in case it doesn’t there is a menu option in the approval view context menu that will only be displayed where the approval number is 0 – Get Approval No.  The most likely use for this function is if you manually change the approval number, but then decide you want to revert to the auto numbering. In this case you can just make the approval number 0, then use this function to get the next approval number.