There are two basic ways to use behaviors. The values loaded by a behavior will come from a Data Group (discussed in the previous section), and can be loaded from the database values or from javascript code.

Behaviors are not secure. They should not be relied upon to prevent or enforce user interaction with the system. They are only meant as a helpful tool to present useful choices to the user, since they can be overcome by disabling javascript from the browser.

It is very IMPORTANT to avoid overlapping the conditions and target fields of behaviors in overly complex ways. See the notes below on 'Field to change' for more details.

Choosing the 'New' button will bring up the form to create new behaviors.

The fields in the behavior form are detailed below.

The rules can match the id or the text values from other menus, so it is safe to use the names of Bins, Priorities, and other data types in place of their ids as desired.

The 'Compare Value' field may be left blank to match empty strings or null values. The 'Sort Order' is used to determine which order the rules will be evaluated.

File based behaviors use columns for a tab delimited file to specify the rules (conditions) which must be met, and which values will be used.

Let's assume that we want to create a new behavior that will change the priorities which can be selected based on the bin and type of issue. We will call this the 'Priority Behavior' for now.

Consider the following rules in our behavior:

Rules
Compare Field	Column Number
-value column-	3
type_id	1
bin_id	2

These rules would tell us that column 1 of our file will be matched against the type_id, that column 2 will be matched against the bin_id. If both of these conditions are met, then whatever appears in column 3 will added to the list of values which will appear in the priority dropdown.

If we have the following data in our tab delimited file:

Data
Column 1	Column 2	Column 3
Project	Engineering	First
Project	Engineering	Second
Project	Tech Support	Customer Down
Project	Tech Support	Normal
Bug	Engineering	High
Bug	Engineering	Low

This data would produce the list or priorities First and Second any time that we create a Project in the Engineering bin. Alternately, if we move this project to the Tech Support team, the priority list would shift to Customer Down and Normal.

However, if we change this to a bug, the Engineering team would have the priorities High and Low to choose from.

Note that, since our file does not cover all possible combinations, we would want to create a 'backup' behavior to handle all other cases. We would give this lower priority (by giving it a higher sort order) and tell it to match anything which equals '' or does not equal '' (basically this means match anything at all).

If our Priority Behavior fell through, then this behavior would get run and would be expected to set the list of priorities to some sort of default set.

What follows is a simple step-by-step example of how to 
create a "Match" behavior and how to create a "Javascript" 
behavior and how to use them together.

Step 1: Enable debugging
  - Open www/header.php
  - Set $Debug_Mode = 3;
  - Save

Step 2: Log in as Administrator

Step 3: Create some variable fields (so we can use them for javascript)
  - Go to Admin -> Ticket Administration -> Edit Variable Fields
  - Find the custom_string1 and custom_string2 fields:
      Change names to "Extra Priority 1" and "Extra Priority 2" respectively
      Check the following boxes:  Tickets, New
      Make sure the default is blank

Step 4: Create a Group
  - Go to Admin -> Settings Administration -> Edit Data Groups
  - Click on New
     Table Name: Priorities
     Group Name: Pri Set 1
     Description: Loads some priorities for fun
     Eval Type:  Matches
	  Eval Script: -blank-
  - Create Group
  - Edit Entries for Group
     Check several entries and save results
     
Step 5: Create another group
  - Go to Admin -> Settings Administration -> Edit Data Groups
  - Click on New
    Table Name: Priorities
    Group Name: Pri Set 2
    Description: Adds custom fields to priority list
    Eval Type: Javascript
    Eval Script:
      // this script adds values placed in custom_string1 
      // and custom_string2 to the priorities dropdown
      
      // create our array which will be used to populate fields
      var x = new Array();
      
      // shortcut to the options in the priority menu
      var options = {form}.priority.options;
      
      // shortcut to value of custom_string fields
      var f1 = {form}.custom_string1.value;
      var f2 = {form}.custom_string2.value;
      
      // recreate menu with existing values
      for( var i=0; i < options.length; i++ ) {
        // insert each value of the existing menu into our new array
        x[ x.length ] = { label:options[i].text, value:options[i].value };
        
        // make sure the menu doesn't already contain our field values, if so,
        // then make sure we don't add them again
        if( options[i].value == f1 ) { f1 = null; }
        if( options[i].value == f2 ) { f2 = null; }
      }
      
      // add values of our custom fields to the array
      if( f1 ) {
        x[ x.length ] = f1;
      }
      if( f2 ) {
        x[ x.length ] = f2;
      }
      
      // now when this is evaluated, the array x will contain 
      // the existing menu values plus anything we have 
      // added via the custom_string fields!  
  - Create Group
  - DO NOT edit entries for the group
  
  
Step 6: Create Behavior for when custom_strings are NOT empty
  - Go to Admin -> Settings Administration -> Edit Behaviors
  - Click on New
    Behavior Name: priority set 2
    Active: checked
    Data Group: Pri Set 2
    Sort Order: 10
    Field to Change: Priority
    Field is Enabled: checked
    Match Type:  	Match ANY Rules
  - Create Behavior
  - Edit Matches
     Row 1
     -----
     Compare Field: Custom String 1
     Operator: Not Equal
     Compare Value: [leave this blank]
     Sort Order: 1
     
     Row 2
     -----
     Compare Field: Custom String 2
     Operator: Not Equal
     Compare Value: [leave this blank]
     Sort Order: 2
   - Save

Step 7: Create Behavior for when custom_strings are empty
  - Go to Admin -> Settings Administration -> Edit Behaviors
  - Click on New
    Behavior Name: priority set 1
    Active: checked
    Data Group: Pri Set 1
    Sort Order: 20
    Field to Change: Priority
    Field is Enabled: checked
    Match Type:  	Match ALL Rules
  - Create Behavior
  - Edit Matches
     Row 1
     -----
     Compare Field: Custom String 1
     Operator: Equals
     Compare Value: [leave this blank]
     Sort Order: 1
     
     Row 2
     -----
     Compare Field: Custom String 2
     Operator: Equals
     Compare Value: [leave this blank]
     Sort Order: 2
   - Save

Step 8: Test results
  - Go to Ticket -> Create New
  - Examine the Priorities Menu
  - Check the behavior output at the base of page 
    (it is updated dynamically each time a behavior runs)
  - Enter text into other_string1
  - Enter text into other_string2
  - Examine the Priorities Menu
  - Check behavior output
  - Change values of other_string1 or 2 as desired 
    and note results
  
Result:
  * You will see that when the page initially loads, the 
    priorities are switched to Pri Set 1 because the 
    custom_string1 is empty  
  * You will note that when the custom_string1 and 
    custom_string2 values are changed, the menu options 
    are updated with these values.