Pop Up list from a calculation field in a related file

[Barry Joyce]

I'm trying to produce a pop-up list to enter the ID of a record from a related file of people's names. These IDs are not very informative so I'm entering the persons name, calculated from surname and first name fields, as the second field on which I wish to sort (I've concatenated surname and first name in that order). When clicking "OK" on the 'Specify Fields for Value List' dialog box I get the following error message

"This value list will not work because the field "SortName" cannot be indexed. Proceed anyway?"

On clicking "OK" several times to get out the pop-up list works OK but is not sorted correctly and I guess when/if I have a lot of entries will work very slowly. Is there an appropriate work round or am I just not doing it correctly?

Thanks for your help in anticipation.

Barry

[Steven H. Blackwell]

Use the double column "Display Also" option for the value lit. That way users see the name, and when they click on it, it enters the actual ID number.

In the People file create a stored calculation that has the last and first names. Be sure that no word is over 20 chars and that the entire name is not over 60 chars. Use this as the "dispaly also" field.

That should work.

Old Advance Man

[Barry Joyce]

Thanks. No error message, but only one entry in pop-up list. After some investigation it seems to be the selection of sort on the second field that's causing the problem, if I remove that then all the records are there - odd!

Barry

[signal]

You can't relate a popup list to a global.

[Barry Joyce]

How is a global relevant here?

[signal]

It's not. I misread your paragraph. :-)

But, Is your calculation set to index (in options)?

The response you are getting would lead me to believe that somehow, your calculation or one of the fields used to make it cannot be indexed.

[Barry Joyce]

Thanks Signal. It turns out the problem had the same solution as another I have had that I put through the Relationships thread. I had not changed the field type in the calculation dialog from the default "Number" to text. This simple change and all is well. I'll not make this mistake again!

Barry