How do I create a subset?

Subsets are used to organize a group of records based on common criteria. When creating a subset, you determine which records are returned by selecting the fields you would like to query for particular values.

While they are often used in conjunction with reports, subsets differ from reports in that they organize the records, while reports format and display the data found within the organized groupings. An example of this would be using a subset to isolate all woman-owned businesses that attended a conference within the last three months and then generating a report that would display the e-mail addresses of those woman-owned businesses. Obviously, subsets are an extremely important and useful tool!

Creating a subset can be as simple as finding all counseling sessions ever provided under the area of customer relations, or as sophisticated as finding all clients located in a specific area code that have three or more employees, a Web site, and have reached a milestone within the last three months.

As you'll see next, there is no limit to the number of criteria you can use when creating your subset; the more criteria you use, the more specific and narrow the results of your subset will be.

The steps for creating a subset are outlined next:

From the left-hand View menu in WebCATS, select the type of record you would like to create a subset for. (You can create subsets for almost every type of record in WebCATS; for this FAQ, we'll be showing images from the client record subset screens.)
Next, you can either select the [Subset] option from the Views field's drop-down menu or you can select the Subset button that displays at the top of the record summary screen, as shown next.

Next, select the fields whose values will determine the records that you would like to be included in the subset, as shown next.

You'll notice that one of the fields selected in the below graphic is denoted by an asterisk. This is a specially calculated field, which means its value is determined by evaluating data from multiple fields or from other record types, as explained in detail in the FAQ titled What exactly are the specially calculated fields that are available for some subsets?.

When you have finished making your selections, click the Specify Criteria button.
At the top of the subset criteria screen, expand the Center(s) area to indicate which centers you want included in your subset. You can place a checkmark next to each center you want to include or you can use the drop-down menu to quickly select all centers, deselect all centers, or select centers according to the region they belong to.
Also in the subset criteria screen, indicate the values that records must (or must not) match in order to be included your subset, as shown next.

As you can see, there are several types of fields and options that you can use to build your criteria. All of these different field types are discussed in detail in the FAQ titled How can I use the various field types and options to best build my subset criteria?.

If you are creating a subset of client records, client activity records, or conference records, you can save your subset for future use by selecting the Save Subset for future use? option and entering a descriptive name into the adjacent Name field.

To learn more about managing and sharing saved subsets, view the FAQ titled Can I save my subset for future use or to share it with other WebCATS users?.

To see the effect that your subset will have, you can click the Check Criteria button at any time during the criteria entry process. This displays a pop-up dialog box with the search statement that will be generated and an indication of the total number of records that will be returned based on your subset criteria.
When you are finished with this screen, click the Finish button. WebCATS displays the subset results as a record summary view.
Narrowing the record summary view to an incredibly specific set of records is a very powerful capability in and of itself. However, you can make it even more powerful by performing any of the following actions on your subset:

Generate a built-in or custom report based on only the records included in your subset.
If it's a client or contact record subset, you can send a mass e-mail to the points of contact in your subset.
If it's a client record subset, you can view activity records belonging to just those clients in your subset.

For more information on subsets, view our other popular resources on this topic:

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