You can specify when and where the relationship occurs with these properties. You specify an entity that contains the time and location values for the relationship. For example, you might have a date entity that specifies when salespeople sold customers products. Specifying these options allow users of your application to get answers to these types of questions:
| Use this | To do this | |
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| This relationship occurs at the time specified by this entity | Specify that this entity determines when a relationship occurs. For example, for the relationship People buy products, the when entity is purchase_date: “When did John Smith buy a hammer? “Who bought a hammer first?” “How many hammers were bought this year?” “What did John Smith buy yesterday?” “Which products were bought in January?” “Who bought a product before December 5, 1995?” |
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| This relationship starts at the time specified by this entity and This relationship ends at the time specified by this entity |
Specify one or more entities that determine when a relationship starts and ends. For example, for the relationship Companies ship products, the start entity is start_date, and the end entity is end_date: “When did Acme start shipping Brand X Soap?” “When did Acme stop shipping Brand X Soap?” “Did Acme ship Brand X Soap in 1995?” (only if both start and end dates are defined) |
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| This relationship lasts for the amount of time specified by this entity | Specify an entity that determines how long a relationship exists. For example, for the relationship People run races, the duration entity is race_time: “How long did Mary run?” “How long did it take for Mary to run the Boston Marathon?” “Who ran the longest?” |
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| This relationship occurs at the location specified by this entity | Specify an entity that determines the location where a relationship occurs. For example, for the relationship People buy products, the location entity is store: “Where did Peter buy flowers?” For the relationship Cities are in states, the location entity is state: “Where is Chicago?” |
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| Default date | Specify that this relationship should assume the selected date. None indicates that the relationship should use the global default setting. | |
| Show most recent data by default | Specify that Microsoft English Query answers are generated from the most recent data in the database. For example, the question, "What is John's salary" shows John's most recent salary. This option is available if the relationship has a date that is part of the key of the join table for the relationship. It is unavailable if th date on the relationship is not a single field. | |
| Module | Specify the module (.eqm file) of which you want the relationship to be a part. | |