#698 Would like to sort combo boxes by ID

[Peter]

Our client would like warehouses to be sorted in combo boxes by m_warehouse_id, not sorted alphabetically by key / name. This would be for example on the orderline screen. They have three warehouses in a particular organization named barnes, pawtucket, thruway, and want it to sort as pawtucket, barnes, thruway.

I tried changing the reference and validation rule, but couldn't figure out how to make this work. We then found we could set identifier on for both name and m_warehouse_id. But it looks like the sort is hardcoded to always use an ascii sort.

Is there something I'm missing - another way around this? If not, would you please add this as an enhancement?

Thanks,
Peter

[Felipe Reyes]

Logged In: YES
user_id=1793135
Originator: NO

No, there is no way to have the combo box sorted by ID.

Could you provide more details on the business case for this enhancement request so we can prioritize it accordingly?
What is the business need and how important it is?

[Peter]

Logged In: YES
user_id=1494904
Originator: YES

Our client is a distributor of fasteners, with 10 physical locations and close to 20 different warehouses across those locations.

This is a business of very slim margins, and in such a business you want to streamline how quickly your people can take orders, as well as from what warehouse you ship the orders from depending upon whether you can pass on the shipping costs to your customer or not.

Each physical location has a sales force and each of them work with different warehouses based upon physical distance due to shipping costs associated with each warehouse with respect to the sales region for that location.

Therefore, the IT team at my client defined their warehouses paying close attention to the m_warehouse_IDs they defined, so that each sales location would have their warehouses sorted by frequency of use - the most commonly used warehouses at the top of the list. This, of course, was assuming that we could control the sorting of the warehouses in the combo box by m_warehouse_id.

So this is a usability issue that directly impacts the bottom line for my client, who look at the time it takes to place an order in much the same way as UPS looks at how many steps each driver must take to complete dropping a package off at a shop (UPS even dictates which foot the driver must lead off with - our client doesn't go quite that far!)

Thanks,
Peter

[James Minney]

Logged In: YES
user_id=1382696
Originator: NO

There is a more generalised need for this, beyond a requirement to be able to specify the sort order of warehouses (other than alpha by the name or the key). In time period selection lists we sometimes found the months coming up in alphabetical order in some multilingual setups. The heading "would like to sort combo boxes by [something other than name or key]" seems like a RFE with wide applicability.