Constrained Picklist

Hey all, new user here…

Use Case
I’d like to group tasks in sections within each project, but section names are unique to each project.

Options

  • setup sub-projects (doable but sections are just labels, with no other props)
  • sections database, where project (1:M) sections (1:M) tasks (preferred)

Issue / Question
b/c a section name is unique within a project, I need to constrain the list of valid values when setting up the related field for tasks, such that user can only choose from sections associated with the project.

Is there any way to do this?

Thx!

The simplest way to do this might be to make your Tasks DB hierarchical, by creating a one-to-many relation to the Task DB. This would add a “Children” collection of child Tasks, and a “Parent” field, to each Task. Your “sections” would just be Tasks, which would contain other Tasks as children.

In theory this approach will also allow you to limit the Sections that are shown as options to assign to a new Task to the already-existing sections – but in practice this could be problematic, or only work in certain situations.

A List view can display such a hierarchical DB with collapsible levels (children under parent).

If you want to be able to display your sections hierarchically like this, where you can collapse and expand them to show their contents, this is the way to go.

Otherwise you could create a separate DB for your “Sections”, and in your Tasks DB add a one-to-many relation to Sections. Then you could sort your Tasks list by Section.

Apart from not being able to collapse and expand sections, the disadvantage to this approach is, it is not simple to prescribe which “Sections” appear as options when you are assigning a Task to a Section.

Thx for the quick reply.

Let me address your second approach first - I’ve already implemented that - again Projects has a 1:M relationship with Sections and Sections has a 1:M relationship with Tasks. The problem is that the dropdown picklist for a given project shows all the sections for all projects and since they’re similarly named, I need some way to constrain the picklist so it only displays the sections for that project.

The same issue exists for the first approach - the dropdown picklist for the parent task will expose all tasks and that would be quite problematic.

So, I think my only options now are either:

  • nested projects - same issue, but not as impactful, since presumably fewer projects would appear in the picklist.

  • static section names (eg Section 01) that are semanticaly meaningless, but would provide a visual partition.

With everything else Fibery has, I have to believe someone has found a way to code constrained picklists…

Have you looked into dynamic relation filters?

1 Like

@Chr1sG G
Thx so much for the quick reply - this works! Took me a second to find the filter, but everything is now nicely setup. Fibery really is a cool product…