Keep order of selected entries "Smart multi-select"

[Stefan Vogt]

Dear all!

Form A contains a list of authors using field type "Text". Form B contains the title of a publication (of type "Text")  and a field of type "Smart multi-select" that chooses the authors from From A. So form B is like the following:

Row 1: [Author 5, Author 3, Author 6] [Text of title]

Row 2: [Author 3, Author 1, Author 4] [Text of title]

Row 3: [Author 2, Author 1] [Text of title]

Unfortunately if If we read out the data of Form B the order of authors as selected during registration is not maintained. So e.g.

Row 2: [Author 1, Author 4, Author 3] [Text of title]

I think they are always ordered according to their UUID (or the timestamp when created?`).

Can Confiforms provide a way to maintain the order as inserted during registration?

Looking forward any hint to solve this issue!

Stefan

[Stefan Vogt · Accepted solution]

Dear all!

I don't know why but after setting the "With lookup" control the order according to the selection is maintained.

Two entries of the form to show you it works well!

[Alex Medved _ConfiForms_]

This is not a smart multi-select field, but a smart multi-row field in ConfiForms.

Totally different thing

But I am glad you have solved your problem

[Stefan Vogt]

Alex you are so right! I was confusing by my first question when i told about the "Smart multi select". Sorry for the misconception.

Regarding the rendering:

Is there a way to get a rendering by table, plain or clean view that gives the following?

Name Author 1, Surname Author 1; Name Author 2, Surname Author 2; Name Author i, Surname Author i; [...] Titel of publication

All the best!

Stefan

[Alex Medved _ConfiForms_]

Hi

Do you set the "sorting" parameter on the smart multi-select field?

Leaving it empty will take the data as it is stored, specifying it will sort the options by label either DESC or ASC way

Alex

[Stefan Vogt]

Dear Alex!

For the field "Smart multi-select" in the Form B there is no sorting activated.

The question is not to sort it by DESC/ASC or according to "as stored in Form A".

Entries of Form A are:

Author 1
Author 2
Author 3
Author 4
Author 5
Author 6

The view of the field "Smart multi-select" should give the order according to the selection of the entries of the field "Smart multi-select" during registration of Form B. So if "Author 3, Author 1, Author 4" was selected it should maintain this order and not use DESC/ASC or according to "as stored in Form A".

Stefan

[Alex Medved _ConfiForms_]

Are you talking about the order if the values within the multi-select itself?

There is no order really - does not matter how you select the values into the field

[Stefan Vogt]

Yes. The order of how the entries of the field type "Smart multi-select" are displayed by e.g. Table view or Plain view.

Stef