HOMEBUILDER:  DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT

In This Article:

Overview | Document Categories | Document Types | Attaching a Document and Assigning Its Category | Example: Attaching to Multiple Locations | Builder Documents | Storage Options | Key Takeaways

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Overview

This guide explains how to:

• Set up Categories and Types
• Attach and categorize
• Find documents centrally
• Configure storage (Business Central vs Azure Blob Storage)

 

Document Categories

Start here. Categories and Types are the two setup tables behind everything else in this article, and a document filed before they are set up will end up with no classification at all.

Find the page by searching for Document Categories, or by navigating in a Role Center: HomeBuilder → Setup → Document Management → Document Categories.

A Document Category is the umbrella term the broad heading a document sits under, the shelf rather than the book. It answers “what kind of thing is this, roughly?”, and it is deliberately coarse. A typical shipped set is:

Field Definitions

Select a row and the Related Information FactBox on the right shows two counts, both of which drill through:

• Document Types — how many Types sit under this Category. Click it to open the Document Types list filtered to this Category.
• Documents — how many attachments in the system carry this Category. Click it to open Builder Documents filtered to this Category. This is the quickest way to answer “show me every colour chart we hold”.

   

A Category cannot be deleted while any Document Type points at it, or while any attachment still carries it. Clear those out first, or leave the Category in place.

 

Document Types

Find the page by searching for Document Types, or by navigating: HomeBuilder → Setup → Document Management → Document Types.

A Document Type is the specific kind of document. If “Insurance” is the Category, “Certificate of Insurance” is the Type. Every Type belongs to exactly one Category, named in its Category Code — a mandatory field. The list is sorted by Category Code, then Sorting Order, then Code, so the Types group under their Category and you can order them within it.

Like Categories, Document Types are shared across all companies.

The fields that matter most: where the document is allowed to live

Each Document Type carries seven yes/no columns. These are the point of the whole table. They say where in HomeBuilder a document of this Type is allowed to be attached — and, by extension, which Categories and Types a user will be offered when they go to classify a file.

Tick more than one where a document genuinely belongs in more than one place. A certificate of insurance is usually both Vendor Contract and Global Vendor: the same kind of document is held once against the vendor as a company, and again against the specific contract it covers.

The other fields

The Related Information FactBox shows a Documents count for the selected Type, drilling through to Builder Documents filtered to that Type.

Worked example: adding an Insurance category and type

1. On Document Categories, create a new Category — Code INSURANCE, Name “Insurance” — and give it a Sorting Order that puts it where you want it in the list.
2. On Document Types, create a new Type — Code CERT OF INSURANCE, Name “Certificate of Insurance” — and set its Category Code to INSURANCE.
3. On that same row, tick Vendor Contract and Global Vendor. Now the same kind of document can be filed in both places: once against the vendor as a company, and again against each contract it covers.
4. Leave the other five columns clear, so that nobody files a certificate of insurance against a Lot or a Model by accident. The checkboxes are as much about preventing the wrong filing as permitting the right one.

 

   

 

Attaching a Document and Assigning Its Category

Attachments are held on the record they belong to. Every HomeBuilder record that can hold documents (Phase, Model, Lot, Vendor Contract, Global Vendor, Lot Installment, etc.) has an Attachments tab in the FactBox pane down the right-hand side of the page.

Uploading the file is the easy half. Classifying it is the half that can get skipped, and an unclassified document is one nobody will find again.

Step 1 — open the Attached Document page

1. Open the record. For the example below, that is a Vendor Contract: open HomeBuilder → Vendor Contracts, select the Phase, and open the contract.
2. In the FactBox pane on the right, go to the Attachments tab.
3. The tab has its own actions menu, reached by the chevron — the small downward-pointing arrow at the top right of the Attachments tab. Click it to show the actions available for attachments.
4. Choose Show Details. This opens the Attached Documents page: the full list of files held on that record, with the detail fields for each one. The FactBox itself only shows file names, which is why the Category has to be set here.

   

Step 2 — pick the attachment and enter the Category Code

1. On the Attached Documents page, select the row for the file you want to classify.
2. In Category Code, open the lookup — the arrow at the right-hand edge of the field, or press F4. A short list opens. This is a lookup, not free text: you cannot type a Category that is not offered, and the list you are offered is filtered.
3. Choose the Category, for example PURCHASER.
4. Then set Type Code the same way. That lookup is filtered again — to the Types inside the Category you have just chosen.
   
   

   

Why the list is short, and why it differs from record to record

The Category Code lookup does not show every Document Category in the system. It shows only the Categories that contain at least one Document Type whose checkbox for this kind of record is ticked.

• Attach a file to a Vendor Contract and you are offered only the Categories that hold a Type with Vendor Contract ticked.
• Attach a file to a Global Vendor and you are offered only the Categories that hold a Type with Global Vendor ticked — usually a different, and often longer, list.
• On a Lot, the lookup accepts Types with either Lot or Purchaser ticked, because a purchaser document is filed on the Lot.

The Type Code lookup then narrows the same way, to Types inside the chosen Category that carry that same tick.

So the list you are offered is the system answering “what is it sensible to call a document filed here?” — and it is the Document Types you set up earlier that decide the answer. If a Category you expected is missing, the fix is on the Document Types page, not on this one.

Result: the document is stored, classified, visible to every user who can see the record, and because it now carries a Category and a Type, it is now discoverable from Builder Documents by anyone who does not know which record it was filed against.

Example: Attaching Insurance Documents to the Vendor Contract and Global Vendor

Vendor Contract

1. Open the Vendor Contract
2. Go to Attachments → Show Details
3. Upload insurance file
4. Assign:
   • Category: Insurance
   • Type: Certificate of Insurance

Global Vendor

1. Open Global Vendors
2. Select vendor → Attachments
3. Upload the same or related insurance document
4. Assign category and type

 

Builder Documents

Find the page by searching for Builder Documents, or by navigating: HomeBuilder → Operations → Transactions → Builder Documents.

This is every HomeBuilder attachment in the company on one list, whatever record it is attached to. Where the Attached Documents page answers “what is filed against this contract?”, Builder Documents answers the harder question: “where is that document?” when you know roughly what it was and roughly who it concerned, but not which page somebody filed it on.

The page is a view, not a filing point. You cannot attach or delete here. You can read, sort, filter, edit the Description, and download.

Field Definitions

Holder and Holder Description are the pair that make the page worth opening. Category Code and Type Code tell you what a document is; Holder and Holder Description tell you where it lives. Between them you can get from “somebody uploaded the fall-protection policy for that drywall trade, some time last year” to the file itself, without knowing which page it was attached to.

The list opens sorted by Category Code, then Type Code, then Holder Description, so documents of the same kind sit together and run in record order within that.

 

   

Finding documents that were never classified

Filter Category Code to blank. What comes back is every file uploaded without going through Show Details, plus anything attached before the Categories and Types were set up.

Use the list to audit and clean up: Holder and Holder Description tell you which record each stray file is on, so you can go to that record, open Attachments → Show Details, and set the Category and Type properly. The Category and Type cannot be set from Builder Documents itself, the columns there are read-only by design, so that classification always happens in the context of the record.

Getting here from the setup pages

The Documents count in the Related Information FactBox on Document Categories and on Document Types opens this page pre-filtered, to that Category, or to that Type. It is usually faster than filtering by hand, and it is the quickest way to check whether a Type you set up is actually being used.

 

Storage Options - Administration Topic

Business Central or Azure Blob Storage

• Business Central database (default)
• Azure Blob Storage (recommended for vendor portal use) - requires setup from the IT company responsible for your Microsoft licensing

Change Global Attachment Storage Company

1. Go to Home Builder Setup
2. Find Attachment Storage for Global Tables
3. Choose the company where global attachments are maintained. You must choose only one company.

Recommendation

• Use Azure Blob Storage if you plan to use the Vendor Portal now or in the future

 

Key Takeaways

• Set up Document Categories and Document Types before anybody attaches anything. Documents filed first arrive unclassified and have to be revisited one at a time.
• Categories is the umbrella, the broad heading. Types are the specific kind of document, and each Type belongs to one Category.
• The seven checkboxes on the Document Type (Phase, Model, Lot, Purchaser, Vendor Contract, Global Vendor, Lot Installment) control where a document may be attached. They are what the Category and Type lookups read, so setting them correctly is what makes the right choices appear for the person filing the file.
• Attach through Attachments → Show Details, and set the Category Code and Type Code in the same visit. Both are lookups, filtered to what is valid for the record you are on.
• Builder Documents is the central view: filter Category Code to blank to find what was never classified, and use Holder and Holder Description to find where a document lives.
• Azure Blob Storage is strongly recommended for scalable storage, and is required in practice if you plan to use the Vendor or Buyer Portal.