Newbie question again, sorry. Is there a way to search in a field and have it search all related fields (in the same file) as well?

Hi sXeThugRWC,

I'm not sure what you mean, by search in all "Related Fields", Do you mean searching several different phone number fields in the current file (i.e. Home, Work, Fax, Cell, etc.), in one request, or searching fields in a portal that is on the current layout?

Maybe if you tell us what you have, and what you are trying to accomplish, we can do a better job in helping you

Lee

let me just start from scratch cuz i was confusing myself. i have a list of delegates to a conference, each in its own field so as to allow them to be coordinated with their home institution. i want to be able to search all the delegates fields without having to know which one a certain person's name may be held in.

ie-record A has "n" delegates. john doe is delegate 7. when searching all the records to find john doe, i would like to be able to type it in one field and have it search in fields "delegate 1" "delegate 2"..."delegate n"

sounds like it should be simple. i'm still learning a lot about FMP so forgive my ignorance.

Hi sXeThugRWC,

Then you should create a calculation field and concatenate the Fields.

Something like this should do it:

c_Delegates, calculation field, text result =

delegate 1 & " " & delegate 2 & " " & delegate n

since these were the only fields mention in your example, that's all I used, but there can be more if you need, just follow the pattern above.

Put this field on your layout menu that you intend to do your search on, and that should do it.

HTH

Lee

Lee Smith = spectacular...thank you so much