TCalc Online Financial Calculators

TimeValue Software™ TCalc™ Online Financial Calculators
Setting TCalc Online Financial Calculator Defaults &
Customizing the Calculator List page
SUMMARY:
Your TimeValue Software™ TCalc™ online financial calculators are provided with predefined
defaults. You may optionally override the built in defaults with your own values. In
addition, you may want to create a calculator list page that has your own design instead of
our generic list page. This document describes the steps necessary to accomplish these
tasks. Each parameter of every TCalc calculator is outlined here for your reference.
Contents:
PREDEFINED DEFAULTS .......................................................................................................................... 3
WHAT IS A QUERY STRING ...................................................................................................................... 3
SETTING DEFAULTS AND CREATING A CUSTOM CALCULATOR LIST PAGE ......................... 3
A SAMPLE CALCULATOR LIST PAGE: ................................................................................................. 4
EXAMPLE OUTPUT FOR CALCULATORLIST.HTML: ........................................................................................ 4
CREATING YOUR OWN CALCULATORLIST.HTML PAGE................................................................ 5
HF01 REFINANCE CALCULATOR EXAMPLE ....................................................................................... 6
DEFAULT SETTING SHORTCUT ..................................................................................................................... 6
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TimeValue Software™ TCalc™ Online Financial Calculators
Predefined Defaults
Your TCalc financial calculators are provided complete with predefined defaults. Occasionally,
you may wish to over-ride these defaults. This task is easily accomplished, but requires a basic
understanding of how our calculators interact with a browser “query string”.
What Is A Query String
The query string is the portion of a dynamic URL that contains the input parameters when a
dynamic web page is visited. When values are entered into one of your TCalc calculators, the
Internet browser (such as Internet Explorer or Netscape) automatically creates a dynamic URL.
This dynamic URL includes a query string based on the results. Query strings typically contain “?”
and “%” characters.
The following URL is an example of a dynamic URL with a query string. The portion of the URL in
bold is the query string:
http://www.tcalc.com/calculators.html?CALCULATORID=HF01&TEMPLATE_ID=www.tcalc.com_1&NEWRATE=5.00
Notice that the query string is composed of “name=value” pairs separated by ampersands. The
query string above instructs the calculators installed at http://www.tcalc.com/calculators.html to:
1. Show the calculator HF01 (CALCULATORID=HF01).
2. Use the registration of www.tcalc.com_1 (TEMPLATE ID=www.tcalc.com).
3. Override the NEWRATE input parameter to be 5 (NEWRATE=5)
The first two parameters are required for every TCalc calculator. The third optional parameter in
this example overrides the default value of NEWRATE in the HF01 calculator only.
Setting Defaults and Creating a Custom Calculator List Page
All TCalc calculator defaults can be manipulated using the query string. To set the defaults, you
will need to create a separate calculator list page (calculatorlist.html). This new list page is not the
same page you created when installing the calculators on your site (calculators.html by default).
You will need both pages.
The list page serves as your entry point into the calculators page. It tells the calculators page
what to display. The calculators page does not really contain anything except a little piece of script
that is waiting to be told what to display. The query string passed to it tells it what to display.
Default values are stored in the query strings for each of your calculator links on the
calcualtorList.html page. All the calculator links point to the original page where the calculators
were installed (calculators.html), and may contain default input parameters specified in the query
string.
This document describes the input parameters that can be manipulated for each calculator. When
working with the calculator defaults, you will find that each calculator is independent of the others.
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TimeValue Software™ TCalc™ Online Financial Calculators
Each calculator may have different parameters associated with it. See the tables that follow for a
list of each calculator and its associated parameters.
A Sample TCalc Calculator List Page:
The following is an example of a CalculatorList.html page where the heading was changed to
“Home” and only two calculators HF01 and HF02 are displayed. We also changed the default
“points” value in the calculator to 2% by setting parameter “POINTS” to “2”. Note: you can make
your calculator list page look however you would like, just make sure the links are setup correctly
for each calculator.
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>Calculator List</TITLE>
<META name=”filename” value=”CalculatorList.html” />
</HEAD>
<BODY>
<H3>Home</H3>
<UL>
<LI>
<A href="http://www.tcalc.com/calculators.html?CALCULATORID=HF01&TEMPLATE_ID=www.tcalc.com_1&POINTS=2">
Refinance Calculator</A>
</LI>
<LI>
<A href="http://www.tcalc.com/calculators.html?CALCULATORID=HF02&TEMPLATE_ID=www.tcalc.com_1">
Fixed Rate Loan Payments</A>
</LI>
</UL>
</BODY>
</HTML>
Example Output for CalculatorList.html:
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TimeValue Software™ TCalc™ Online Financial Calculators
Creating Your Own CalculatorList.html Page
When you create your own calculatorList page you may want to start with the links on the generic
list page that the calculators.html page produces. Then modify these links with the defaults you
want. Simply click on one of the TCalc calculator links and your browser will display that
calculator, and in the “address” field it will display the proper link to that calculator. Copy this
“address” as the link for that calculator on your new calculatorList page.
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TimeValue Software™ TCalc™ Online Financial Calculators
HF01 Refinance Calculator Example
Please Note: The parameter names are case sensitive. Some parameters have limited possible
values. Please check your query strings prior to posting derived links on your web site. To check
a query string, simply type the complete query string (including the URL to your calcualtors.html
page) into your browsers “address” field.
Existing Loan
Field Description
Original amount of your loan:
Number of payments made on your loan:
Original loan term:
Months/Years Toggle:
Current interest rate:
Compounding period:
Parameter Name
ORIGINALLOANAMOUNT
PAYMENTSMADE
ORIGINALTERM
ORIGINALTERM_UNITS
CURRENTRATE
CURRENTCOMPOUNDING
New Loan
Field Description
Amount you wish to cash out upon refinance:
New interest rate:
Points:
Fees and closing costs:
New loan term:
Months/Years Toggle:
New compounding period:
Parameter Name
CASHOUT
NEWRATE
POINTS
OTHERFEES
NEWTERM
NEWTERM_UNITS
NEWCOMPOUNDING
Other Information
Field Description
Your income tax rate:
Your investment rate of return:
How long will you keep this property:
Months/Years Toggle:
Parameter Name
TAXRATE
RATEOFRETURN
BALLOONTERM
BALLOONTERM_UNITS
Default Setting Shortcut
You can quickly set defaults without knowing much about the query string structure. Just visit a
calculator, enter the values that you’d like to see as default. Next, click compute. You will see
that the address of the resulting page has all the defaults pre-populated. This is the address to be
used in your custom calculatorList page (see page 4 of this documentation). Simply copy this
address and paste it into the HREF attribute of your custom link.
These links can be pasted throughout your site making the calculators very accessible from
anywhere in your website. Some developers even drive default rates off of database driven
values. Others integrate housing financial details into their MLS listings (real estate). The
calculators are built to integrate.
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