Unit 2: Managing Views

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Questions Covered

• How do we define the information displayed in the table view?

• How do we change what information is displayed?

• How can we highlight the records of interest?

• How can administrators make alternative table views available for different sets of users?

• What sorting options are available for views?

• Is there any way to edit fields directly in a view?

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What is a Table View?

• A table view is what you see in the center pane when you click on a table name in the left pane.

• Views define the fields to be displayed when viewing multiple records in a table.

• Example: The Leads table may contain 50 fields, but if you are only interested in Full Name, Telephone Number, and Status, define a view that shows only those fields.

• You can save multiple views to display records in different ways as you work.

• Views can include color-coded rows or status-based icons to provide information at-a-glance, making it easy to identify records of interest.

• Users can create their own views and administrators can set views as the default for specific teams.

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Table View Example

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Special System Views• Each table has three special views that cannot be deleted or

hidden.

• Summary view: Used as the default view until an admin creates a new view and applies it as a default for a given team.

• Personal view: This starts out as a copy of the view that is assigned as the default view for a user’s primary team. Users may edit and save their personal view to adjust it to their preferences.

Tip: Each user has their own personal view. Changes made to their personal view will not affect the personal view of other users.

• Mobile view: Used when accessing the system through the mobile interface.

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Why Create Multiple Views?• We typically recommend creating at least two main views for each process

table: one that is a basic default, and one more detailed view showing more fields.

• In addition, if a table is shown as an embedded table (e.g., an embedded search result or related table) in another record, it is usually best to make a view specifically for that purpose to achieve a more efficient display within the record.

• Example: When looking at the main People table, you will probably want to show the Company field. But when looking at a table showing people within a company record (showing all the contacts at that company), you do not need to see the Company field in the view because you are in that company’s record and know what it is.

Tip: When creating a related table field, you can assign or create a view specifically for that purpose.

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View Wizard

• The View wizard is accessed by creating or editing a view. The wizard is composed of the following tabs:

• Fields: Select which fields to include, whether to display edit and/or view icons, and the number of lines per record.

• Order/Colors: Adjust the left-right ordering of fields and optionally define row coloring and icon use.

• General: Name the view, define the view width, and choose the number of records displayed per page.

• Apply: Set access to the view and set the view as a default for various teams.

Only admin users see the Apply tab.

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Editing a View

• The next few slides will take you through editing various features

of a view. All exercises will be done with the training view within

the Contracts table.

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Editing a View: the Fields Tab• Click on the Contracts table in the left pane.

• Mouse over the Views menu, and select Training View. After the view

loads, select Views > Edit to begin.

Practice

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Fields Tab Settings• The first options on the Fields tab let you add view, edit, and custom icon columns to the view.

• When Show Icon Column is selected, a custom icon can be displayed based on achoice field value in the record.

• Next you can set the maximum number of lines of text displayed in the view for both single fields and for fields with multiple values.

• Below those options is a table of all the fields in the current table, and a set of checkboxes next to each field. Check Display to include the field in the view.

• Checking the Edit or View column turns the field into a hyperlink to edit or view the record, respectively.

• You can specify an exact Column Width or leave the default ‘automatic’ selection.

• Check the Quick Edit box to allow the field to edited from the table view.

• You can also choose to Right Align specific fields in the view. Some types of fields, such as the currency field used for Contract Amount, are easier to read if right-aligned.

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Editing a View: Field Selection• Select Show Edit icon and Show Icon Column, but not Show View icon.

• Leave the default selections of 2 lines per record and 1 line per linked field.

• Uncheck the following fields in the Display column:

• Assigned Team, Country, and Locations.

• Check the following fields in the Display column:

• Company Name, Contract End Date, and Contract Start Date.

• Check the box to Right Align the Contract Amount field.

• Change the width of the Contract Title field to 40.

• Make any other changes you like.

Practice

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Adding Quick Edit

• A quick edit view lets staff users change field values without opening the record. You might want to enable a quick edit view for only particular users, such as support technicians, who need to quickly add notes to a case.When enabled, a yellow pencil will appear next to the field name.

• To enable quick edit, locate the Quick Edit column on the Fields tab. If the Display checkbox is selected for a particular field then you have the option to also add quick edit by selecting the appropriate checkbox.

Quick edit can also be limited by permissions for specific fields. For instance, the function could be enabled for a user to change the Assigned Person but disabled for the Asset Type.

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Best Practices for Views• To save space, we generally show the Edit icon but not the

View icon.

• To allow users to view a record, we check the box to show the ID field as a View hyperlink (to the right of the field).

• For most tables, displaying each record in 2 or 3 rows is ideal. If the table has very limited information, 1 row might be enough.

• For column width, generally Automatic makes the best view. The only fields we set a value for are date/time fields (to 14), forcing them to wrap onto two lines.

• On the General tab: A view width of at least 110 or 120 is generally preferred.

• For fastest performance, showing fewer fields and no more than 30 records per page speeds page loading.

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Order / Colors Tab Settings

• The Order / Colors tab allows you to drag and drop to set the order of the fields that were selected on the first tab.

Generally, it is best to drag all the fields onto one row.

• However, if you have a form with a lengthy text field that you want to display, you can put that field on its own row to display across the full width of the screen by dragging it down to the area that says No items to drag to create a second row. The content of that field is displayed without a field label.

• You can also set variable row formatting and different icons to be displayed next to the row based on the values in a choice field.

If you want to provide different coloring based on a combination of different criteria (due date less than 1 day in future in red, for instance), you can define a Choice field with color names as the choices, and use rules to set the record to a particular color value based on your custom criteria.

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Editing a View: Set the Order• Click on the Order/Colors tab.

• Note that the newly added fields appear to the right of pre-existing fields.

• Drag and drop the fields to put them in the following order, from left to right:

• ID; Company Name; Contract Title; Contract Start Date; Contract End Date; Status; Contract Amount; Date Created

In general, it is a best practice to place the ID field leftmost, and to place more relevant fields to the left of less relevant fields.

Practice

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Editing a View: Row Coloring• Click Set Row Coloring.

• In the Row Coloring wizard, select the Status field from the dropdown.

• Click Next to move to the Colors tab. You will see a set of options for each value of that choice field.

• Change the following Status color options:

• Cancelled and Expired: In the Font Color drop-down, select Gray.

• Active: Set the Background Color to Lime and then click the lime-colored box to open the color dialog:

Adjust the color either by moving the cursor in the color box or by entering HSV or RGB values.

• Pending Approval: Set the Background Color to a pale yellow by keying in the hexadecimal code #FFFF9C.

• Click Finish.

Practice

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Editing a View: Notification Icons

• Click Define Notification Icons.

• In the Icons wizard, select the Status field and click Next.

• For the Cancelled status, click Select/Manage Images.

• Select the following icon from the pop-up:

• At the top of the pop-up, click Select Image and Exit to apply the icon.

• Apply any other icons you like for the other status values.

• When you’re done, click Finish to return to the View wizard.

• Click Next.

Practice

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General Tab Settings

• Options on the General tab:

• Create a view name.

• Set the maximum and minimum width for the view.

If the Minimum View Width is set to “None,” then the view will only be as wide as the data being displayed, which can sometimes look too narrow. We prefer to make it the Same as Action Bar.

• Choose how many records to show per navigation page.

There is a tradeoff when choosing the number of records per page:

Too many records and fields can mean slower screen refreshes.

Too few records and fields may affect productivity.

We recommend 30 as a reasonable number.

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Editing a View: General Tab

• In the view you are editing, change the View Name to “Training Default.”

• Change the Maximum View Width to 120 characters.

• Change the Minimum View Width to Same as Action Bar.

• Change the Records Per Page to 30.

Practice

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Apply Tab Settings

• The Apply tab is only visible to admin users.

• It allows the admin to make views accessible to specific teams and to apply a view as the default for certain teams.

• A user on multiple teams can see all views that are available to any of their teams. The user’s default view is the default assigned to their Primary Team.

• A team has only one default view.

• The primary team default view is the user’s personal view until they log in and customize their personal view.

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Editing a View: Apply Tab

• While editing your training view, navigate to the Apply tab.

• Under the Make this view visible to section, select the Change settings option. This will activate the selection list of teams.

• Click Select All. This makes the view available for all teams.

• Check the option to make the view available to Any new teams that are created.

• Under the Make this a default view for section, follow similar steps to set this view as the default for all current and future teams.

• Click Finish to save the results of your changes. Check out your new view!

Practice

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Views and Sorting

• Sorting of the records is handled by saved searches, not by views.

• There is no sort order defined for a view, but any saved search can load a particular view, and then the results will be sorted according to the search.

• We will cover saved searches in Unit 5.

• The default sort order is by descending ID number. A down arrow by the IDcolumn heading indicates the sorting.

• Users can sort records in real time by clicking on the column headings of the view. A second sorted field can be added by holding down the shift key and clicking a second column. The table below is sorted first by Status and then by Contract End Date:

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Creating a New View

• Based on what you have learned, try creating a new view.

• Explore the various options in the view.

• Once you have saved the view, play with sorting records in the view.

Practice

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View Summary

• We have learned how to:

• Edit an existing view.

• Create a new view.

• Use views with different row coloring and notification icons.

• Sort records in a view

• To expand your understanding:

• Experiment with the other view options and combinations.

Different options and combinations will work better for some tables than for others.

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Conclusion

• This concludes the unit on working with views!

• The following sections contain short videos that demonstrate each

of the hands on exercises contained in this unit. They are best

watched after each practice exercise for confirmation or during

each practice exercise if assistance is needed.

• There is no sound, only video, as the purpose is to simply show the

navigation and walk through the wizards for the task being addressed. The

videos are entirely optional. Any essential videos will be included within

the unit itself.

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