Fran Lombard
Registered User.
- Local time
- Today, 11:54
- Joined
- Mar 12, 2014
- Messages
- 132
Looking to find examples of a Data Structure to Support a decision tree. Cant seem to find any practical examples.
Here is an explanation of the business need.
I've been working on creating an Estimating or Quoting module within my access application i use to manage my Home Improvement business. In the module, Ive created a series of Items (Things we make). These items are small units of work that when grouped together define recognizable bigger things.
Each item has two sub or detail tables
ItemActivities and ItemParts.
These tables hold records that define the labor steps and materials needed for each item. However, since the combinations of all the things we do and choices of which material could be used for a particular item is so large, some of the key fields in the detail tables need to be changed at quoting time based on the answers given to a series of questions.
In most cases, the required change can be determined by the answer given to one question. This is relatively easy and straight forward. In other cases, however, multiple questions need to be asked and answered to get you down to the leaf node of the decision tree and obtain the answer needed by the processing code.
Sometimes the set of questions are very linear and dont change based on the answer, you just need 2 or 3 bits of data to get your answer.
However, sometimes the answer to an intermediary question on the branch results in a different question being asked.
My requirements are to create 1 unified normalized set of tables (and the forms) to support the above requirements.
So far, my search of the web has resulted in plenty of references to MS Data Mining but no real practical examples of a working set of data structures.
Any guidance or direction would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks Fran
Here is an explanation of the business need.
I've been working on creating an Estimating or Quoting module within my access application i use to manage my Home Improvement business. In the module, Ive created a series of Items (Things we make). These items are small units of work that when grouped together define recognizable bigger things.
Each item has two sub or detail tables
ItemActivities and ItemParts.
These tables hold records that define the labor steps and materials needed for each item. However, since the combinations of all the things we do and choices of which material could be used for a particular item is so large, some of the key fields in the detail tables need to be changed at quoting time based on the answers given to a series of questions.
In most cases, the required change can be determined by the answer given to one question. This is relatively easy and straight forward. In other cases, however, multiple questions need to be asked and answered to get you down to the leaf node of the decision tree and obtain the answer needed by the processing code.
Sometimes the set of questions are very linear and dont change based on the answer, you just need 2 or 3 bits of data to get your answer.
However, sometimes the answer to an intermediary question on the branch results in a different question being asked.
My requirements are to create 1 unified normalized set of tables (and the forms) to support the above requirements.
So far, my search of the web has resulted in plenty of references to MS Data Mining but no real practical examples of a working set of data structures.
Any guidance or direction would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks Fran
