Prioritizing Portal Rows

[Jonathan Smith]

hello,

I am attempting to prioritize rows in a portal. I have tried having a field that is a drop down with the values 1-5, but the fields stay the same, regardless of what data i pull from related tables. has anyone else had experience in prioritizing related information in portals?

[David Jondreau]

You seem like you're on the right track. You need a Sort field in the 'child' table that displays in the portal. You need to make sure the portal is set to sort based on that Sort field. That's all.

[Jonathan Smith]

I have been able to sort the data using this method, however, as i switch between records, the data in the priority field stays the same.. Meaning that, if on Record 5 items 1,6,13,15, and 25 are priority 1, when i switch to Record 127 these same items are still listed as priority 1...

[Søren Dyhr]

Here is it done with a cartesian relation portal.

--sd

priortize.zip

[Jonathan Smith]

in the definitions, did making the files not equal keep them from duplicating when other data is inserted?

[Søren Dyhr]

come again ...do you wish to strain the dropdown as well, so if 3 and 6 is used won't they occure in the next selection or??

--sd

[Jonathan Smith]

basically, the portal loads PRODUCTION ITEMS that are still in need of being produced. sometimes, only a few parts of the job need to be produced first, while the others can wait. the portal now loads related records, sorted by the JOB ID. I would like to be able to have a single record for each JOB ID, and within this a portal that lists all parts ready to be produced. I need the priority button/field to move the needed items to the top of the list. does this sound possible?

[Søren Dyhr]

Yes thats pretty simple, in the row have a button that enters .5 in the priority field, then GTRR(SO) ...sort the records and make a serialized scripted replace on the entire set:

http://www.filemaker.com/help/Script-Steps52.html

But beware, the method isn't multiuser safe, if thats the case must the serial number be pre- or postfixed with the username, in a pilcrowdelimited field that then is translated into the sortorder field.

--sd

[comment]

I don't think you need to go as far as scripting a replace, since the internal order of records with the same priority doesn't matter (or so it seems).

A portal sorted by priority should be the answer. It looks like the real problem is with the implementation of this.

[Jonathan Smith]

why is there a prioritize and prioritize 2 table? what is the significance of having 2 table occurences?

[Søren Dyhr]

How would you portalize something without two TO's? - here is it a cartesian selfjoin.

--sd

[K1200]

This thread reminded me of a question I've intended to ask:

Does anyone know of a way (maybe a summarizing calculation of some sort) to cause the portal to spontaneously refresh following a selection from the value list?

In the past, I've used a plug-in to trigger a refresh script, but I've often wondered if there wasn't a better way.