Mar

13

Related Records List Update – Part Three

Filed Under Tutorials | 4 Comments

I played around with Smart Collections as the source for Related Records and it got so complicated that I can only repeat: expect some strange behavior. The only real useful implementation would be a new field type which would combine a Related Records List with a Smart Collection that would update automatically– like the behavior of a stand-alone Smart Collection. Maybe sometime in a future Bento update…

Relational Loops are a wonderful thing. Example: you drag the Address Book Library onto the Projects Library, and then the Projects onto the Address Book. Now you create a new record for a project. In that record you choose any number of addresses from the Address Book to be displayed in the Related Records List Field.
Let’s say you added Mr. Smith. Now go to the Address Book and search for Mr. Smith: in his record you’ll find the new project listed automatically in the Related Records List Field! Very handy.
And it works the same the other way around: if you decide later that Mr. Brown should also be assigned to the same project, go to Mr. Browns Address Book record and add the project to the Related Records List Field. Now his name is automatically added to the right record in the Projects library.

Tip: you can rename any Related Records List Field. By default it gets the name of the source Library, but in the above example you might rename “Address Book” to “Team Members.” Renaming the Field has no effect on the name of the actual source Library.

I hope this update cleared up most questions. For more screen shots see the original tutorial. Please don’t hesitate to leave a comment with additional questions.