Getting More Out of Filtered Portals: 6. Hierarchical Portal

[comment]

found only two solutions - this one and the one of excelisys dot com...didn't try the second one so far, but as I understand the algorithm is the same)

Perhaps you are not aware of the true context of this thread: filtered portals are a new feature of version 11. My demo shows how to use them to produce a hierarchical portal. Previous techniques are by necessity based on radically different methods. IMHO, the filtered-portal method is significantly simpler - however, it is limited in the number of records it can accommodate. That said, I haven't tested how the other methods perform with a large amount of records.

There is no such thing as the "best solution"; it all depends on what are you trying to accomplish and how you plan the users workflow.

[Reed]

could I bother you to repost the modified version of this technique that uses global variables rather than a global field?  The file in the original post won't download for me.

 

Thanks,

 

Dana

[comment]

This is weird, because the attachment is there and can be downloaded by going to the URL directly:

http://fmforums.com/forum/index.php?app=core&module=attach&section=attach&attach_id=14596

[Reed]

Thanks!

[Reed]

One more question kind of related to this.  I'd really like a way to get the positioning of container field graphics to follow along with the indent of the text.  I'm thinking maybe a calculated repeating container field where the repetition populated depends on the hierarchy level.  Has anyone else extended this "tree" to allow icons to follow the hierarchy?

 

[comment]

I don't see why not - provided you are willing to prepare a graphic for each indent level.

[Dafu]

Thanks very much for this method! I never would have thought of this way of doing a hierarchy.

 

I have an enhancement.

 

If you have more than 20 records or so the display performance becomes . . . ghastly. The culprit is the cAncestorIDs field definition.

 

if you change the field definition from:

List ( 
Parent::cAncestorIDs ;
ParentID
)

to:

if (ParentID ≠ "";

List ( 
Parent::cAncestorIDs ;
ParentID
);
ParentID)

You will get a colossal speed increase: Importing 300 records with the original definition was more than 5 minutes; after the change, 10 seconds or so. Display performance is now really quite acceptable.  %^)   Before, the list function was executing every time the record was touched and list functions are expensive.

 

Thanks again for the method!

 

Dave

 

[shredded]

Reviving this old thread!

I am struggling to understand how I can implement this in a two table format,

whereas the parent table holds the country and childs table holds the states.

Any ideas, am I just missing something simple?

[comment]

9 minutes ago, shredded said:

how I can implement this in a two table format,

A portal can only show records from one table, so this particular technique will not work for you.

Moreover, this was designed for infinite hierarchy (continent -< country -< state -<city etc. ). If you have only two levels, you can probably use something simpler.

 

[shredded]

7 minutes ago, comment said:

A portal can only show records from one table, so this particular technique will not work for you.

Moreover, this was designed for infinite hierarchy (continent -< country -< state -<city etc. ). If you have only two levels, you can probably use something simpler.

 

Thanks for the reply... Any suggestions on something similar? I was really hoping for a portal of parents, that could open related children, similar to file system.

Parent1

----Child 1

Parent2

----Child 2

----Child 3

----Child 4

Parent 3

----Child 5

----Child 6

[comment]

I suggest you start a new thread.