This article provides an overview of the rules you can create in the Creating records section on the Rules tab in the Data Garden project.

The conditions and actions which you can select are identical to those in the Creating Records and Event Based sections. The difference is the timing:

Creating records: at the moment a record is created

Mutating records: at the moment the record is mutated, for example when the status changes from new to complete

Event Based: every 4 hours, regardless of changes to the record

The rules you create in the Creating Records section are executed at the moment that new record is created, for example if you import a new file. If you want to adjust or enrich the data that is in the files you are going to import, this is where you have to program the rules.

Examples of what the DRE can do for you:

- create a nice salutation you can use in an email invite

- receive an email notification if records have been created which match certain conditions

- enrich data with a reference table

- change the status of a record 

You can choose if you want to use the wizard or if you want to create expert rules. You can also create a rule with the wizard and then click on 'Convert to expert'.

Similarly to the DRE in other parts of the system, you have to select conditions first:

Then select the action(s) that should be executed:

Create or change DB value allows you to select a column first and then to enter the value you want to have in the database for the records that meet your criteria. For example: if Gender is M (condition), then set the value in the column Salutation to Mr. (action).

Set record to status is where you can alter the status for a record. When newly imported, the status is automatically set to new. If, however, you would like to change the status to Active or Complete, you can do that with this rule.

Send Mail is where you can set up a trigger email which is sent when the conditions you select are met upon creation. You could use this as an alert, for example if you would like to be notified if there is a record imported that does not have an email address, or if there are records imported for a particular store.

VLookup is a function which you can use to enrich your data, by using another import or project as a reference table. If the imported files for your project have a store number, and you have a separate file which contains additional information such as the name of the manager and the address of the store, you can add that additional information to your data garden. The VLookup function can almost be compared to the Excel function with the identical name. 

First of all, you have to select your Lookup Column. This is the column in your current Data Garden project which you will use to match to the reference project you will use. Then you select which dataset you want to use as your reference table, and in addition the lookup column in that data set.

Now you can select the column which contains the data you want to be added to your project and the column where it should be added. Click on the + next to the selection boxes and, if you want, you can add other columns as well.

An example how how your VLookup should look:

There is a separate import slot named Store Information, containing a Storenr and additional information about the store such as the name of the manager and the address. In the data garden, column Donr contains the storenr. Now, the VLookup will, for each record that is imported, compare the Donr value to the values in the separate data set Store Information. If there is a match, it will add the name of the manager to the column StoreManager and the address to StoreLocation. 

This function is very handy to improve the quality of your data. If there is information you can not include easily in your import files, you can use the reference table to add information. Of course, you can use the same reference for multiple projects.