Typing to skip through menus

[uemtux]

Hi Everyone,

Apologies if this has been covered before, I searched first, but couldn't find the information I needed.

I am running FileMaker Server 11 (I had to upgrade to 11, so that the new FileMaker ODBC Driver for PC would work with my solution) and my clients are mainly 8.5 and 9 Mac.

I have pulldown menus in my solution which are a selection of products. There are 700-odd items in this menu, and the sales people are accustomed to typing a few letters in order to skip down to the product they are looking for.

As near as I can tell, this behaviour has been removed in FMP 10 and 11. This is kind of a big problem for me, as we cannot live without this functionality, but some of the new features I'm being asked to develop require script triggers.

Am I missing something here? Was this incredibly simple and useful functionality really taken out of FileMaker?

[Vaughan]

Use a filtered portal instead of a menu.

[uemtux]

If you want a more accurate description of where I use these menus:

We have order records. We have an "order line items" table related to it. The order line items appear in a portal on the order. Adding new line items involves selecting a product from a pulldown menu in classic portal line items entry fashion.

So "use a portal" doesn't really help me... could you maybe explain in more detail?

Also, was the "type to skip in menus" functionality REALLY removed from FileMaker? I am curious if the problem is just something related to my set up... I deployed FileMaker to these machines remotely... maybe something i did during the installation broke this feature somehow?

[uemtux]

Hello, just bumping this thread to see if I can get a response. Has the ability to skip through the items in a pull-down menu by typing a few leading characters been removed from FileMaker 10 & 11? Yes/No ?

Thanks

[Lee Smith]

Hi uemtux,

You Profile shows 8.5, are you using 10 or 11 now?

This has not changed, however they have added a feature in 11 that allows you to show or hide list.

Why are you asking this, are you having a problem with it?

Lee

[Chris Cain]

Typing the first letter to get to an item in the value list works on drop-down lists, but not pop-up menus (I'm unclear which is your "pulldown menu").

You can also make the field "Auto-Complete based on value list" so that your list gets shorter as you start typing. Again, this is only on drop-downs, not pop-ups.

Is it possible you've switched to pop-up menus?

If not, here's another possible "gotcha": The type-ahead works on the field you're sorting by. If, for instance, your value list of item id's also shows item names, and you're sorted by name, it'll jump into the list based on the name. If you're sorted by number, it'll jump into the list based on the number.

HTH

[Vaughan]

So "use a portal" doesn't really help me... could you maybe explain in more detail?

To select a product the user slicks a button that opens a new window (or changes window) that displays a picker which uses a filtered portal to display the options. Selecting the item closes the window and enters the value into the line item record.

Pickers are pretty standard interface widget and used where the number of options exceed the practical maximum for other alternatives like pop-op menus -- the "practical maximum" is usually around a dozen options.

[bcooney]

This demo might help. It demonstrates a popup select technique.

http://fmforums.com/forum/showpost.php?post/365428/