Another Simple Portal Problem...

[coreyj78]

Ok, maybe what I would like to do is impossible, but according to me it seems like it should be pretty simple. I have a photo database with one main layout. On the main layout, each photo has a unique ID number. For each record, there is a field for the ID number and also a field for keywords (like people, business, food, etc.) and a small thumbnail of the photo. Users can do searches in the keywords field to then find a group of photos thumbnails (records) which match their search requests (as on a stock photo website).

Now, what I would like to do is this: when people perform a find on certain keywords, and are then given their new found set of records, I would like all of the ID numbers (from the ID number field) of the found records to appear in a portal on the same main layout (next to the keywords field). This way, users can see their find results immediately on the same layout without switching to a list view. AND I would like this same portal of information to appear on each record of course. So when users browse through their find results, they will constantly be able to see the portal list with the ID numbers of their find results.

Is this possible? Can anyone help me?

[ernst]

Hi Corey,

There are several ways to accomplish this.

You could script the find operation and do a 'copy all records' script step on a separate layout that only shows the record ID's, then go back to the original layout and paste the clipboard into a global textfield.

Drawback is that you can have 'only' 64000 characters in a text field, which would limit your maximum amount of search results to 6400 if each ID is 9 character long...

Alternatively you could use the 'filtered portal' technique that has been described in this forum many times.

Hope this helps,

Regards,

Ernst.

[coreyj78]

Thank you very much for you quick reply.

Since I will eventualy have many records, in my situation, how would I set up a simple filtered portal on my main layout to make this work?

Thanks so much for your help.

Corey

[ernst]

Hi Corey,

A short explanation:

Create a global text field to enter your search criteria in. Attach a valuelist to this field that displays as checkboxes and gets it's values from the 'keywords' field.

Create a relation from the global search criteria field to the keywords field.

You can display the search results (ID's keywords, short description) in a portal showing the related records, eventually with a button on each portal line that does a 'show related record' step that takes the user to the corresponding record.

Again, in the 'Sample' section there are lots of files that show this technique, so have a look there too!

Best regards,

Ernst.