Allow No or Multiple Values for All Filter Operators

[bsanders]

In the old reporting tool there was an option to have 0 or more values per filter and each one would be evaluated based on the filter Operator. This was critical to our business process as each user running a given report has different requirements for what they need in the results. Some users would require the report to provide all data from the system, and some would require anywhere from 1 - 100 filter values. In the new reporting tool the only way to have multiple values per filter is to use the "In" operator which requires an exact match, and if there is a filter a value must be entered to return results. This is a problem when the full value is unknown or if there are no filter values needed.

eg.

If I have 30 accounts which have variations of the same account name "Spam Eggs and Spam" and another 30 with variations of "Meridian Memories Photography." If I want to pull back all accounts which have "Eggs" or "Memories" in their names I would need to use the "Contains" filter on these words.In the current reporting tool I would be able to add both of these as Filter Values at Run-Time and would get a single report containing all 60 accounts. However since the new reporting tool only allows a single value to be used for the "Contains" operator, these would need to be run as separate reports. Alternately if I wanted to use this same report and return All accounts in the system, I would have no way to do so since if the filter is left blank the report will not return any results and there is no way to omit a filter at Run-Time.

Since there is no way to know in advance how many filter values need to be added (or if they are needed at all), we need the ability to either leave the value blank or have multiple values for a filter regardless of the operator type or filter key.

[chris]

Ben - thanks for flagging this. Regarding entering multiple values, do you have examples where you would use this for operators other than 'contains' or is this the primary need for you all?

[bsanders]

@chris  You would be correct in saying that I overstated when I initially said All. Realistically this would be for any operator which is working on a logic based association instead of an exact match association. From the list of available Operators I would say that this would also affect the following:

"does not contain"

"starts with"

"does not start with"

"ends with"

"does not end with"

With any of the above operators along with "contains" we could potentially be looking for a report including multiple values for each filter. While the "contains" operator inherently includes both the start and end operators since this searches both directions (where x = '%hello%', as opposed to where x = 'hello%', or where x = '%hello') I realize that from a run-time optimization perspective these probably need to remain separate, and so we would need it on these as well.

[chris]

Thanks, @bsanders - that's really helpful context, and that makes it a more compact problem to solve on our side.

[CKHarwood]

If I understand the issue correctly, this also affects the "is equal to" Operator. For example, we had a report in the old tool that took one or more user-provided Subscription.Name values as a filter. The version of this report migrated into the new tool will only take one subscription at a time. If I don't understand the issue correctly, then I need to submit a new idea.

[bsanders]

Hi @CKHarwood "is equal to" is an exact string match by definition, A = B. Since the new reporting tool defines the "In" as an exact match operator per value, you should be able to use the "In" filter to allow for multiple filter criteria. Using the "In" filter will require you to define a default value which can be either real or a description and then as long as the "Ask User Later" option is checked your end users will be able to define their own filter values (as well as remove the default).

[CKHarwood]

Thank you, @bsanders. That works perfectly and explains what the "in" Operator is for.

[bsanders]

@chrisHi Chris,

Is this something that is being added to the release roadmap anytime soon?

[chris]

@bsanders - we are trying to stay away from timing estimates pre-release since this is hard to nail in advance, but we'll do our best to update as we have news here.