Hot to Patch to update multiple records

[UB400]

I came across this Formula in the UX Patterns: Multiselect Blog

ForAll(Filter(Gallery1.AllItems,Checkbox1.Value = true), Patch( ProfileSkillSets, Defaults(ProfileSkillSets) ,{ ProfileID:EditForm1.LastSubmit.ID, SkillsetID:ID, Skillset:Title }))

This works great when adding new Records, however I would like to Patch a value into a specific Column, so how do I select the record for Patch to work?

Essentially I have a Gallery called GalleryDocs, which displays Documents from a Sharepoint Document library, I've inserted Checkboxes into the Gallery and I would like the User to select documents and then hit a button which will trigger the patch to update MetaData for the Docs.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Meneghino]

Hi @UB400

I think there are two possible approaches:

1. using the ForAll function patching single records
2. patching a table of updates

For the first approach you would use the same as the UX patterns:

ForAll(Filter(GalleryDocs.AllItems,Checkbox1.Value), Patch(MyDocLibrary, {ID: ID} ,{MetadataColumn1:MyMetadataControl1.Property, MetadataColumn2:MyMetadataControl2.Property, etc. etc. }))

The ID:ID in the middle may seem strange but it should work without the need for disambiguation, if not then you need to disambiguate.

The second approach could in theory be more efficient/faster, since it should only make one call in total to the server instead of one for every line.

It could be something like this:

Patch(MyDocLibrary, Filter(GalleryDocs.AllItems, Checkbox1.Value).ID, RenameColumns(RenameColumns(ShowColumns(Filter(GalleryDocs.AllItems, Checkbox1.Value), "MetadataControl1.Property", "MetadataControl2.Property"), "MetadataControl1.Property", "MetadataColumn1"), "MetadataControl2.Property", "MetadataColumn2")))

I have not tested this second method, and renaming the columns using the controls in the gallery could be problematic and need some debugging.

Please let me know how you get on.

[UB400]

Thanks @Meneghino I tried the First option, it works great! Dude you're a genius! Thank you so much, I really appreciate it.

I have a somewhat related question that I hope you can answer:

I have a gallery with check boxes, which I want to use to filter items in another Gallery and I have some additional drop downs as well that I want to Incorporate into the Filter, I've been struggling with this and can't really make it work.

Here's the scenario:

I have an SP list which I'm displaying in a Gallery. I want to be able to filter by several controls:

1. Is a DropDown List which is "Region", first item in the Region list is "All"

2. Is  Gallery of Checkboxes for "Countries" (there are several Countries in a Region), displayed checkboxes are filtered by value of Region DropDown.

3. Is a Gallery of Checkboxes for "Tags" that reflect the content e.g. "Dog", "Labrador", "Sheepdog", "Cat", "Siamese" etc, basically the User can check if content has any of these tags in the content

4. If possible add a Search Textbox, to search a particular column for say "Title"

So if Region is not selected, then we treat Region ="All"

User Selects Countries applicable and tags applicable and we throw a search textbox in the mix

I need to make a provision for the User not selecting anything and the various combinations of.

Any ideas, I'm really stumped with this one. 

[Meneghino]

Hi @UB400

There are many good ways of achieving what you are trying to do.

Firstly I would consider using a list box instead of a gallery for the selecion of the countries and tags.  This also allows for multiple choices and is simpler than a gallery.  In any case the mechanics are the same, so what I am going to say below does not change.

Let's take it one step at a time and start with the region/country piece.  For the sake of argument, let's assume that you have a table (either static or data source, called MyWorld) with two columns: Region and Country both of text type.  Also let's assume that your data table (MyData) has only a column called Country of text type.

Now, I would suggest this:

1) Create a dropdown (DropdownRegion) and set its Items property to this:

Ungroup(Table({MyTables: Table({Region; "All"})},{MyTables: GroupBy(MyWorld, "Region", "AllRows").Region}), "MyTables")

See this post of mine to see where this comes from

2) Create a listbox (ListboxCountries) and set its items property to this:

Filter(MyWorld, If(DropdownRegion.Selected.Region="All", true, Region = DropdownRegion.Selected.Region))

3) Set ListboxCountries.DisplayMode to this:

If(DropdownRegion.Selected.Region="All", DisplayMode.Disabled, DisplayMode.Edit)

4) Set your data gallery Items property to this:

Filter(MyData, If(DropdownRegion.Selected.Region="All", true, Country in ListboxCountries.Selected.Country))

Let's get this working and then add features (such as the ability to select all countries in a region, tags, text search etc.)

Please let me know how you get on.

[UB400]

@MeneghinoThanks for your reply. My explanation of what I want to do was not very good, let me try again.

Lets say my Main list is a list called "News", I then have "related" Lists called "SelectedCountries" and "SelectedTags"

So when I add a new "News" Item, I'm also Patching the ID of the "News" record into the "Related" Lists, because a "News" Item often has many Countries in the record, see image below.

For the Filtering I can see you know what I want, what I'm struggling with here is "joining" the tables of "News" and "CountriesSelected" to be be able to accomplish the Filtering. 

I'm open to suggestions, if you see a better way of structuring the data, I'm happy to follow

[Meneghino]

Hi @UB400

What you describe is a many-to-many relationship, and the way you are implementing it is absolutely correct, by using a 'linking' table between the two sides of the relationship.

I would suggest that renaming a few objects would maybe make things clearer (but be careful if you use SharePoint since the name changes will not propagate).  For example the CountriesSelected list is really better named as CountriesNews for example.  Please see this article on this.  I would also change this list's ID column to CountryID, so the list has only two columns: CountryID and NewsID.  Depending on what your back-end is (i.e. SharePoint or SQL Server or other, please advise) there are a couple of tricks that may be needed to make this work.

Please see this thread on many-to-many relationships in PowerApps.

Just to clarify before proceeding, you must also have a Tags list, right?

Finally, I would replace the RegionName column of the Countries list with RegionID, to be consistent.

Please let me know if I have now understood your situation correctly and what back end you are using to store the lists (i.e. SP or other)