lookup using drop down list and copy fields?

[J__]

Hello,

first, i want to emphasize my thanks to this forum, i appreciate all the help.

Suppose you have a list of play lists (for songs), and you have another table full of Songs with artist information and so on.

I want to have a drop down list with the song names in it on a "Select Songs for Playlist" layout (with a playlists table/detail) - kind of like invoice / line item stuff... in fact, just like it.

This is no problem and I have been able to do this. I want to copy some of the fields into the Playist record. If i use a ID in an edit control this works great. If I use the name of the song in a drop down it doesn't work. What do i need to do to get this to work? Do i need to index the ..... or maybe create a relation which is the id and the name?? hmmmm maybe that's it?

suggestions?

thanks

J__

[Ugo DI LUCA]

Hi,

As a start, you shouldn't use value list for this purpose, and as a general rule, whenever the number of items dropping down from it could be important, which happen to be the case here.

It doesn't make much sense and isn't user-friendly as soon as the list gets too long.

A better choice, IMO, would be to rely on a portal, may be popping up in a new "Select" window, either based upon a Cartesian relationship or more probably filtered.

The big advantage is that you can still use the selected Song ID as a relationship, without even noticing and showing it.

[J__]

I agree with you. i had considered that, but wondered if there was just something i was missing. The list actually is not going to be that large - for my current needs to that is ok.

One problem i have with the popup approach though is keeping it on top.

any thoughts on that?

thanks for the response