Combobox allows filtering of all matching results, not just exact matches

[JScherff]

Hi, 

I have a screen with the top half (horizontally) acting as a multiple combobox filter area and the lower half is the gallery view of the matching results.  I'm trying to add functionality for the gallery to return all matching results from the Sharepoint list but it's only finding the exact matches.  I'm sure the formula needs to be tweaked...

I was assisted by another user a while back to create a gallery that gets updated from a TableData card that has the actual filter criteria.  This then updates the gallery.

The filter code in the "Update" function of the TableData is:

{
    TableData: Filter(
        Lessons,
        DBApproved = "Yes",
        (IsBlank(cboLLROwner.Selected.Result) || Owner = cboLLROwner.Selected.Result),
        (IsBlank(cboLLRWho.Selected.Result) || Who in cboLLRWho.SelectedItems),
        (IsBlank(cboLLRWhen.Selected.Result) || When  in cboLLRWhen.SelectedItems),
        (IsBlank(cboLLRWhere.Selected.Result) || Where in cboLLRWhere.SelectedItems),
        (IsBlank(cboLLRSuggested.Selected.Result) || SuggestedReviewPeriod = cboLLRSuggested.Selected.Result),
        (IsBlank(cboLLRResType.Selected.Result) || ResolutionType in cboLLRResType.SelectedItems),
        (IsBlank(cboLLRWhat.Selected.Result) || What = cboLLRWhat.Selected.Result),
        (IsBlank(cboLLRWhy.Selected.Result) || Why = cboLLRWhy.Selected.Result)
    )
}

The main gallery then has the following formula for "Items": 

SortByColumns(LLTableData.Update.TableData, "What", Ascending)

The only item that I need to alter is the "Who" line to allow it to match criteria found in the Who column where the departments are stored as departments separated by commas like, "Ops, R&D, MKT, MAIN".  If I select "Ops" in the combobox, it only returns records that only have "Ops" in the Who column.  I want it to find all records that have Ops listed either standalone or somewhere ( (any position) found within the departments listed in that column (i.e., R&D, MAINT, Ops").

Currently works like this:

Finds the records that ONLY has what is selected in the combobox (i.e., only returns Records 1 and 4 below)

Record 1: "Ops"

Record 2: "Ops, R&D"

Record 3: "AO, MAIN, Ops"

Record 4: "Ops"

Future State:

Finds ALL records that have the department selected in combobox anywhere in the "Who" column of the SharePoint list (i.e., Returns Records 1,2, 3, and 4)

[poweractivate · Accepted solution]

@JScherff 

I can explain this to you in detail with a specific example below: 

Suppose my SharePoint list of S5List01 below:

In this case suppose I want Listing A and B to be returned from the above (i.e. containing banana)

If I do exactly like you did,

Filter(S5List01,Listing in ComboBox1.SelectedItems)

I will get only Listing B as above and not both Listing A and B like I want.

The reason is because when the Filter is operating on Record A of the Filter,

I am comparing apple,banana,carrot (Listing) to see if it is contained within the word banana (an element of ComboBox1.SelectedItems) - and of course since the longer string apple,banana,carrot cannot possibly be a smaller portion of just banana this obviously returns false.

The only way that would return true is if the ComboBox's Selected Item itself had said apple,banana,carrot - do you understand?

So I should write the formula like this instead:

Filter(S5List01,!IsBlank(LookUp(Split(Listing,",") As ThisListing, ThisListing.Result in ComboBox1.SelectedItems)))

I get both Records in the Gallery I expected now, A and B

The reason it works is because I first split the string containing all of the strings in it, into individual strings without the commas. 

Split(Listing,",")
This makes a Table. 

Next, I use the LookUp function, but rather than a whole data source or collection I just use the Table itself that was Split as the input table, using the As operator to name each individual element of the Split(Listing,",") Table as the name of my choosing, ThisListing.

So I have:

LookUp(Split(Listing,",") As ThisListing, ThisListing.Result in ComboBox1.SelectedItems)

Basically I say - From the outer filter, I have the column Listing accessible to each Record. Now take each comma separated Listing in the Listing column (that is a single string at the moment), and give me a Table of individual Listings (strings) instead, each string being a row of a Table and without the commas - that's what Split(Listing,",") does. Now take that Table, and LookUp for me , using each individual Listing itself as a convenience inner element called "ThisListing", and using something called Result that's inside it (this has to do with what Split did with the strings - each one of those individual strings without the comma, ends up as an individual row of a Table, in a single column called Result - that's why it's ThisListing.Result) - with each of these elements called "ThisListing.Result", check if it's contained inside of ComboBox1.SelectedItems.

This LookUp will either return one record (Not Blank) or no records (Blank)

Now I want to simply know if it's Blank or Not Blank, because I want to reduce the whole second argument of Filter to just true or false, which is what the outer Filter is actually looking for,  so that's why I use the IsBlank function wrapped around it. I've inverted it intentionally to !IsBlank

So if it is not blank it's true - if it is blank it's false

In other words, not blank means the LookUp returned one record - so it means that one of the individual components (not the whole comma separated string but one specific part of it as you want) has matched one of the ComboBox Selected Items - we want that situation included in the returned Records of the Filter so we want to check if it's not blank and if so, we want it included (true) - otherwise, if there's no match, we want it to return false meaning the LookUp returned no record, and so there was no match at all, and so it should not be included, but should be excluded from the Filter instead.

Does it make sense now @JScherff ?

Your Scenario

So @JScherff - in your specific scenario, I'd recommend something like this:

Rewrite your formula of

(IsBlank(cboLLRWho.Selected.Result) || Who in cboLLRWho.SelectedItems),

to something like the below instead:

//do something like this instead
(
       IsBlank(cboLLRWho.Selected.Result) 
   || !IsBlank
       (
           LookUp
           (
               Split(Who,", ") As IndividualWho
              ,IndividualWho.Result in cboLLRWho.SelectedItems
           )
       )
),

I have intentionally put a space after the comma for your scenario because it may not work without the space. Your examples of multiple departments seem to be separated by both a comma and a single space, rather than just a comma like in my example, that's why I use Split(Who,", ")

See if it helps @JScherff 

P.S.: I have intentionally avoided the use of the ForAll function here. (Try to avoid using ForAll for just its convenience of looping over things and for no other reason, especially if you try to use it just to loop over something but won't be using the output table of ForAll in any way. Even if it may "work", it's probably going to perform less efficiently that way, and it is not a good practice or habit to get into. In my case, if I had used a ForAll in this scenario, I would probably not have used the output table of ForAll at all, so I avoided using ForAll here. It may be tempting to use ForAll here, but it is better not to use it - so that's why I have not used it here).

[JScherff]

THANK YOU!  This was SUPER helpful.  I actually came across the "Split" function right before I saw that I had a reply here, so I think I was finally started in the right direction.  I really appreciate all the time you took to explain this in detail and to format the "fix" into my specific code/application.  

[Ronak83garg]

Thank you @poweractivate  for your detailed explanation, I finally managed to resolved the issue 🙂