I've had to do things like this in the past, to me it all depends on what type of data you have and the way it which it will be used on the front end. It also depends on your end users!
Sometimes containers and publishing rules (with array types) are the simplest way to go and make sense to the end user, other times that just doesn't seem like the best approach. One of the main reasons I (sometimes) don't like this is that editors have to edit the actual content in the backend then go to the front to do the sorting. Not the most user friendly option (again it depends on what you're trying to achieve). We had FAQ's which were a custom type also using farcry categories to group the content, but we wanted an exact sort order within each category. Couldn't rely on alphabetical or datetimelastmodified etc. Yes we could have done it with a publishing rule but decided to create a simple sorting table which was generic and can be used across different farcry types. - categoryId - data - parentId - sortOrder - typename This way we can link any table to this table and we have enough data to do custom sorting (via categories, parent items, types etc). Sorting is handled through a single page with drag/drop functionality so if all a user wants to do is sort they can sort without sending a current item to draft etc. It's also loaded in as a wizard step so they can perform the sort while editing an item. Michael On Mar 15, 10:07 am, Blair McKenzie <[email protected]> wrote: > It sounds like you plan to go with mirrored containers (ironically the most > recent docs on the subject seem to be written for > 3.0<https://farcry.jira.com/wiki/display/FCUSER30/Containers>). > > Thinking about the problem, if a client had a strong need to be able to set > an arbitrary order I would probably end up adding the 'position' property, > and building a custom edit UI (ftEdit methods have come up in the list > before). It should be possible to use jQuery UI > sortable<http://jqueryui.com/demos/sortable/>to create a > choose-a-position UI, then update the positions of other content > on save. Of course, it would only be practical if you knew the recordset > would always be quite small - a long list would become unwieldy. > > Blair > > > > > > > > On Tue, Mar 15, 2011 at 1:57 AM, Kevin Purcell <[email protected]> wrote: > > That was my initial thought, as this would be the way that I would do > > it if building a bespoke database and CMS for a site. The issue with > > this approach is that there doesn't seem to be a central way of > > modifying these values (eg. to allow the user to 'move up' and 'move > > down' items). If the user needed to move an item within the list, they > > would need to edit each content item in turn and manually update this > > value to maintain the consistency of the values. If there were only > > four or five content items, this could work with a little training, > > but if there were a larger number of items it would quickly become > > unmanageable. > > > It seems like a choice between the lesser of two evils - either manage > > the ordering of items on the front-end using rules and potentially > > need to maintain multiple lists, or manage it on the back-end using a > > 'display order' property and force the user to edit all items affected > > by a move. > > > I'm sure someone with more knowledge than me could edit the webtop > > admin listing for the content type and add the functionality I need, > > but I'm still taking baby steps! > > > -- > > You received this message cos you are subscribed to "farcry-dev" Google > > group. > > To post, email: [email protected] > > To unsubscribe, email: [email protected] > > For more options:http://groups.google.com/group/farcry-dev > > -------------------------------- > > Follow us on Twitter:http://twitter.com/farcry -- You received this message cos you are subscribed to "farcry-dev" Google group. To post, email: [email protected] To unsubscribe, email: [email protected] For more options: http://groups.google.com/group/farcry-dev -------------------------------- Follow us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/farcry
