14 minutes ago, Wim Decorte said:

And you can search directly on that field.  If you are not familiar with related searches then experiment a bit with it until you are comfortable with it.

So, basically, in a nutshell: If I just have a relationship setup and use that related field on the layout, I'm forever going to see the oldest entry ever made under that relationship listed there unless I've got some sorting method applied in that layout or to that relationship?

First <--> Oldest, meaning if I add 0, 1, 2, 3, entries .. and at a later date delete 1 & 2, add a 4, 5, 6... that 3 being the oldest in the relationship at that point would be the one I would see in that field?

This part should be a different thread anyway.

Only a sort in the relationship definition would change what related record shows up.  Not any kind of sorting of the parent records (the layout).

And yes: in the example you give, #3 would be the one show since it is the oldest surviving one in creation order after you delete #1 and #2.

2 hours ago, Tony Diaz said:

I'm forever going to see the oldest entry ever made under that relationship listed there

Yes -  but since your title is "related searches" it should be clarified that searching the child field will search in all child records, not just the first ones. 

 

Yes.. I understand that .. a found record from any of those results would not necessarily show the found result on the layout if the matched data is in a field not programmed to show on the layout.

That's what pop-overs and "hide if" scripting on the layout.

Good distinction to keep in mind.

Searching on a related field will yield a found set of all parents records who have a matching related record among all its related records.  Not parents where the first related record matches.

Visually that may throw you off if you don't show a portal of all related records.

Of course if you want to do a search where only the 'main' (aka first) publisher matches then you can loop through the initial found set after doing the search and omit the ones where that first related record doesn't match.

2 minutes ago, Tony Diaz said:

a found record from any of those results would not necessarily show the found result on the layout if the matched data is in a field not programmed to show on the layout.

I don't think I follow what you're saying here.  If you do a search from a layout and there are no scripts or triggers involved that would change the layout then the found set will be in the layout you did the search on.  Whether you search in a field that belongs to the TO that the layout is based on, or a related field.  If you are on a layout for books you will always get a found set of books, even if you search the related publishers field.

I mean that if I search for a value in that related table that happens to be newer, that the record when loaded may not show me that value if I'm only seeing the oldest related value, as mentioned previously.