Best way to 'archive' an entity?

[Dimitri_S]

I don’t really like the method of just setting the state to “Archived” because then it becomes something I constantly have to filter out.

I also don’t really like the Convert To option because (correct me if I’m wrong) it requires that I manually keep the field names in sync and it also breaks relationships.

Seems like this could be something that requires a script which a) moves the entity to another “Archive” space and b) re-establishes the relationships.

Any other ideas?

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To provide a use-case for this, say I have an Orders space and a Products space. Orders have products. If I decide to stop carrying a product I want to archive it but still keep the record of orders accurate, to be able to calculate monthly sales, etc.

[Chr1sG]

@Dimitri_S

it requires that I manually keep the field names in sync

unfortunately, yes.

@Dimitri_S

it also breaks relationships.

actually not. if the relations are configured identically, the links to other entities are maintained.

@Dimitri_S

If I decide to stop carrying a product I want to archive it but still keep the record of orders accurate, to be able to calculate monthly sales, etc.

It should be OK for this use case, provided that you have identical databases (e.g. ‘Current products’ and ‘Discontinued products’)
Or at least identical in the important fields (maybe some fields aren’t needed for discontinued products).
Of course, you need to remember to delete the original entity after duplicating.

Your Orders database will now have two collections - one for ‘Current products’ and one for ‘Discontinued products’. And actually, this might help prevent people creating a new order for a discontinued product.

[Oshyan]

Before trying to address this, either with existing features, or some open feature requests, I would first ask: what does “archived” status mean to you? What specific results/outcome/effects do you want this status or action to have/create/etc? I ask because I do think there are several existing requests which might be related to some or all of your needs. For example:

Filter search results based on Field Values

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[Dimitri_S]

So to give you some context in Google Drive I have a “Clients” folder which has active clients I am currently working with and inside this folder is also an “Archive” folder. When I get done with a client I move their folder into the Archive folder so its out of sight out of mind unless I need it for some reason.

I’m basically trying to replicate this kind of functionality.

In either case I decided to move forward with the “a script which a) moves the entity to another “Archive” space and b) re-establishes the relationships.” approach. A simplified version of how I am doing this is shared here:

Script equivalent of the "Convert to" feature?

Figured it out but leaving this up here for others reference. Here is my script equivalent of the Convert to feature but with the ability to map to dissimilarly named fields. const fibery = context.getService("fibery"); for (const entity of args.currentEntities) { await fibery.createEntity("Space B/Db Y", { "Person Name": entity["Name"], "Person Salary": entity["Salary"], }); await fibery.deleteEntity(entity.type, entity.id); }