MedLook Weekly Tip For 05/02/2007

MedLook now sports an XML data file for the layout of the Print Image output to file and paper. Rather than inventing a new editor to specifically edit this file we have opted for commonly available editors. The editor delivered with MedLook (on CD and on our website) is XML Notepad. Everybody who uses Windows is familiar with the standard Notepad text editor. It is by no means a word processor but a simple, light-weight, text editor. In the same way, XML Notepad is a simple, light-weight, XML editor. It is not intended for heavy or intensive XML editing. XML Notepad is perfect for our purposes. This is a VERY simple editor.

To use XML Notepad it must first be installed and then set it as the default Layout Editor. The latter is done using the Options dialog. Under Miscellaneous Options the Layout Editor field must be set to point to the installed location for XML Notepad. Usually this is c:\Program Files\XML Notepad\xmlpad.exe as shown below.



After clicking on the Edit Layout command XML Notepad starts up as shown below.



On the left hand side, under the column titled Structure, you see Data, then Comment, Electronic, Paper, a bunch of Comment lines, and an extra section called OldFormatPaper. The right hand side has a single column labeled Values. We're concerned with the two sections: Electronic and Paper. Electronic contains all of the parameters controlling the layout of electronic claims while Paper is for printed claims. Let's assume we need to edit the output claims filename and location. In the dialog below you see that we have opened up the Electronic section (by clicking on the + symbol to its left) and have highlighted the data in the Values column to the right of Claims-File1. At this point you would enter the complete path and filename you want to use for your primary output claims. There is no validation during this process so use some care in specifying a valid path and file.



What if you needed to move the entire printed (paper) output down one line and to the right one character? Assuming your initial values for Top and Left are 0.00 you would add 0.17 to the Top (one vertical line spacing) and 0.10 to the Left (one horizontal character). If you needed to move left or up, you would simply decrease the numbers.

What if box 24 line 1 needed to move down just a little? You could edit the Top of box 24 line 1 aFromDate Top, select Edit Replace and then replace the Top value with a value just larger than what is currently there (e.g. 7.03 should be replaced by 7.10). Just keep clicking Replace until you have edited all of the items in box 24 line 1. Use caution to change values only in box 24 line 1 in this case. Likewise you could do something similar if you needed to move the From DOS (aFromDate) to the left or right a little for all of box 24.