Search fields

Owned by Dorian Port
Last updated: Sept 05, 2014 by Paul Sugg
3 min read

The presentation configuration screen includes another tab labelled "Search fields".  Selecting this tab will allow you to choose which options are displayed when an administrator selects the search button in the current screen.

If you have been changing labels / fields in the 'Display fields', please ensure you select 'Update' before switching tabs

Selecting which fields to include in searches

To alter the values, click on the presentation layer icon and select the 'Search fields' tab.  The available fields are listed in the left hand column and include fields in the current database table (and related tables where possible).  The fields that are currently configured as search fields are displayed in the column on the right of the screen.

To enable fields for searching, select in the left hand column and tap on the right arrow to move to the right hand column.  To remove fields from the search menu, select in the right hand column and tap the left arrow to remove from the current presentation configuration.

Copy from display fields - There is a button added to copy the fields from the "Display fields" to "Search fields".  If you want to configure exactly the same fields as are displayed, use "Copy from display fields" to add all fields.

Changing the format of search fields

Search fields can have date and picklist type displays, which are configured in exactly the same way as display fields, using the "Type" dropdown box.  Please check the format of each field, if it has a different "Display field" format (for example, in Display fields we are showing "Yes" to users instead of "1" stored in db), it will confuse users unless the same format is replicated in search.  If the same format is not contained in both places, users will be searching for "Yes", but no results will be returned (as "Yes" hasn't been configured in "Type" for search fields).

To check/change the search display format, please see Display fields in the "Type options for date fields" and "Type options for status fields".

Check for fomat of search fields

Select each field in "Display fields" and check its "Type" for format / picklist values.  These should be replicated across search fields if you want users to use the same parameters for search as are displayed in the UI.

Splitting fields

In the 'Display fields' section, users can combine fields to display in the same column.  You will need to split these fields into individual search parameters if you want to use in a search (you cannot have a combined field in searches). 

When configuring search fields, please select each of the fields configured to check for combined fields:

  1. Select the presentation configuration icon
  2. Tap on the 'Search fields' tab and check the details displayed, do any of your fields have two values, separated by a comma in the 'Dbfieldname'?  If fields have two values, you will need to remove the current field from the search and add the two fields back in as separate entries:
    1. Make a note of the two values combined.  Select the combined field and select the left arrow to remove from the current presentation configuration
    2. Select the first of the values (that was separated by a comma) in the left hand column, tap on the right arrow to add to the current presentation configuration
    3. Repeat the exercise for the second field listed
  3. Select "Save" button in the top left of the screen to save your changes