Sorting and grouping by Category and/or Fields

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Viewing 5 posts - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)
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  • 02/12/2014 at 12:16 am #279880
    Eric Bobrow
    Participant

    Hi Steve –

    My client has an international organization and wants the main directory list to show entries grouped by world region (a category such as Europe, North America, etc.), then city, then by status (a category such as Provider or Researcher).

    I looked through the forum and found an old post in which you stated that there was no easy way to list the directory sorted by category. Is that still the case?

    Regardless of the answer to the category question, is there a way to sort and group by Country or any other field? That would definitely be appreciated in this case. If this is possible, it would be ideal to be able to put the actual country or field name as the title of each group of entries.

    I’m comfortable with basic PHP editing, so if you give me a bit of direction, I can manage that.

    Eric

    02/14/2014 at 8:26 pm #280085
    Steven Zahm
    Keymaster

    @ Eric

    Right, sorting by category … there is not built in method to do it. Actually, there is no built in method to grouping at all. You can sort by several fields. See the order_by doc page.

    The best direction I can give … you would have to modify this function’s query to support grouping. Then you would need to add a shortcode option, here, to tell the query what to group by.

    I hope that helps.

    02/15/2014 at 3:06 am #280096
    Eric Bobrow
    Participant

    Thanks Steven.

    We have worked around the issue by placing many separate shortcodes on one page. Each shortcode is set to show directory entries from one country, and we have text headings above each one with the name of the country. This will work OK for my client, he’s happy with it.

    Sorting and grouping with headings would be a good feature enhancement to consider implementing. This is a common method to organize larger directories, whether by department, interest group, or location, or even a combination. Perhaps you could make this a premium add-on feature – people who have large organizations could justify spending more to get this extra option, while those with smaller organizations (and less money) don’t need it. I’d buy it myself for my other directory website, the ArchiCAD User Group, an international directory of architects who use ArchiCAD software.

    Eric

    • This reply was modified 12 years, 6 months ago by Eric Bobrow.
    • This reply was modified 12 years, 6 months ago by Eric Bobrow.
    02/15/2014 at 10:47 am #280101
    Steven Zahm
    Keymaster

    @ Eric

    Yes, that works too. That is something I do usually suggest … guess I suggested the coding way because you mentioned PHP editing.

    Yeah, grouping is on my todo list. It is just a little lower on the list because it is not requested all that much, yet. As Connections continues to grow, I do imagine grouping will be requested more and more for the very specific reasons you mention.

    02/15/2014 at 2:08 pm #280109
    Eric Bobrow
    Participant

    Hi Steven –

    I fully understand how you have to prioritize your to-do list, so no problem there. I hope you get to it before too long…

    While I can hack away at basic PHP, it would take too much effort and concentration and trial and error for me to modify the function query and add the shortcode. I do appreciate that you pointed me (or anyone else reading this thread) exactly where to look!

    No need to respond to this – I’m all set for now. Thanks again for your friendly and expert advice and prompt responses!

    Eric

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