The Basics of Defining a Filter with the Filter Builder

When you first access the Filtering page, the Filter Builder is selected by default and there is a single entry area for a Filter Condition Set. A Filter Condition Set is a set of one or more filter criteria, with each criteria comprised of a column, an expression, and a value.

Each Filter Condition Set can be comprised of one or more criteria, with an “And” or “Or” connector implied between each of the criteria. Each criteria is comprised of a column, an expression, and a value.

In the example below, the first filter criteria is set to look for items where the Status is “In Progress” and Assigned To is set to the currently logged in user. The second criteria is set to look for items where the Status is “Not Started” and Assigned To is set to the currently logged in user.

To define a filter:

1.  If the condition set is only going to contain a single condition, you can ignore the first drop-down, which default to “And.” If the condition is going to contain multiple conditions, select “And” or “Or” from the drop-down to specify whether all of the conditions have to be met (And) or just one of them (Or). You cannot mix “And” and “Or” conditions within a single condition set.

2.  The first drop-down on the next line presents a list of all of the columns that are available for filtering. These are the columns you identified on the Display Wizard’s Columns page. Click to select the column you want to start building your filter with.

•      A filter cannot be defined based on the site, list, and/or folder name

•      The Filtering page supports column names that contain quotation marks

3.  The next drop-down is used to select the desired expression for the filter. The table below presents a list of the available expressions and their meanings.

4.  The third drop-down is used to identify the value you want the filter to find. You can simply type in the value you want to find, or you can use the [ME] function to filter on the currently logged in user.

•      If the selected column is a Choice column, the drop-down will show the available choices to select from.

•      If the filter is being built based on a date column, any of the functions listed in the table below can also be used.

NOTE: Using Date Functions

•      The date functions are all relative to the current date.

•      If you do not define an ending date or function, the Data Display will return all items that meet the filter criteria from the defined date function going forward. For example, say you define a filter that looks for a Due Date greater than or equal to [Quarter1Start] and do not define an ending date. The Data Display will return all items that have a due date from the start of this year’s first quarter to whatever is the most future due date on any item in the list(s). It will not limit the items to the first quarter, or the current year, unless you tell it to.

5.  If you only want to filter on a single column and a single value, your filter is complete. Once all three fields of the condition have been populated, the red icon to the left of the condition is automatically changed to a green icon to let you know that the expression is valid.

6.  If you want to add another condition to the condition set, click the Add Another Condition button. Another set of three entry fields is displayed. Repeat these steps from Step 2.

7.  If you want to define an additional condition set, click the Add a Condition Set button. A new Filter Condition Set area is displayed. Repeat these steps from Step 2.