Grids

Every list in Shipbuilder is the same grid — the overview pages, the relationship blocks on a detail page, the history browser. It repays twenty minutes once, because finding things is most of the job.

1 Tabs: the same records, prepared differently. 2 The magnifier searches every visible cell for a word. 3 The funnel filters this column; the ⋮ is the column menu. 4 Active. In use or Not in use — the closest thing to deleting. 5 Columns and Filters: a side panel for choosing and filtering. 6 The footer: page size, and how many rows there are in total.

Documents, the In use tab. Forty-six documents, twenty to a page.

Documents, the In use tab. Forty-six documents, twenty to a page.

Sorting

Click a column header. Once for ascending, again for descending, a third time for no sorting at all — that third click matters, because a grid you left sorted looks like a grid with rows missing when you come back to it.

One click on Status (builder): every Approval from Class together, every Closed together.

One click on Status (builder): every Approval from Class together, every Closed together.

Sorting is frequently faster than searching. Forty-six documents sorted by Status (builder) put every drawing that is with the surveyor together; sorted by Date they put the oldest current revision on top; a search asks you to know what you are looking for first.

Filtering on a column

The funnel in a column header opens the filter for that column: a search box over the values, a checkbox per value, and Reset.

A column filter lists the values actually present in the column — including (Blanks) for rows that have none.

A column filter lists the values actually present in the column — including (Blanks) for rows that have none.

The checkboxes are the values actually in the column, which makes the filter a decent way to see what a field holds before you touch it. Press Enter or Esc to close it.

Two filters on two columns combine — Is of type = Drawing and Status (builder) = Approval from Class is the list of drawings with the surveyor — and a filtered grid does not announce itself loudly. When a row you are sure exists is not there, clear the filters before you doubt the data. Reset does one column; the column menu’s Reset Columns puts the whole grid back.

Searching the grid

The magnifier on the block header opens a search box, and what you type is matched against every visible cell — number, name, remark, cost code description, whatever is on screen.

Searching for a word narrows the grid to the rows that contain it, in any column.

Searching for a word narrows the grid to the rows that contain it, in any column.

Use the search for words — half a name you remember, a number you were given — and the funnel for values a column takes, where ticking is quicker than typing.

The column menu: layout, not content

The ⋮ beside the funnel is a different menu, and it is about the grid rather than the data.

The column menu — how the grid is laid out.

The column menu — how the grid is laid out.

• Pin Column holds a column against the left or right edge while the rest scrolls. The one worth pinning is whichever column tells you which row you are on — usually Number.
• Autosize This Column / Autosize All Columns fit the widths to the content. This is the fix for a column that shows Fire detection system in… when the screen has room for all of it.
• Choose Columns adds and removes columns. A grid showing three columns is often hiding the field you were looking for.
• Group by folds the grid into groups on that column’s values.
• Reset Columns undoes all of the above.

Columns can also be dragged by their header to change the order, and resized by dragging the edge between two headers.

The Columns strip on the right opens the same list as Choose Columns, and stays open while you work.

The Columns strip on the right opens the same list as Choose Columns, and stays open while you work.

The strip’s second tab, Filters, is every column’s filter in one panel — the place to set two or three at once and see them together, rather than one funnel at a time.

The Filters panel: all the funnels of the grid in one list, on the right.

The Filters panel: all the funnels of the grid in one list, on the right.

Right-click: the context menu

Right-clicking a row is where the actions are, and they are named for what you clicked on rather than generically.

Right-click on the Name cell of a document. What the menu offers depends on which cell you clicked.

Right-click on the Name cell of a document. What the menu offers depends on which cell you clicked.

Create Document	Alt+N — a new row of this kind
Edit Document Name	Alt+E — opens the editor on the cell you clicked
Clear Document Name	Alt+Backspace — empties that one field
Delete Document	Alt+Delete — the whole record; usually not what you want
Browse history for Document	Alt+H — who changed what, when
Copy / Paste	Ctrl+C / Ctrl+V
Export	writes the grid out, as you have it on screen

Note “Document Name”: you right-clicked the Name cell, so the edit and clear actions are about that field. Right-click the Remark cell and the same menu offers the same actions for Remark. Clear empties the field; Delete is about the whole record — see Entering information for why it is rarely the answer.

The footer

1 to 20 of 46 and a page size. A grid showing twenty of forty-six rows is not a grid that lost twenty-six — check the count, the page, and the filters, in that order. The page size is a dropdown; set it to a hundred when you want the whole register on one page to sort through.

The keyboard, if you prefer it

• Enter on a column header sorts it.
• Alt+↓ opens that column’s menu.
• Ctrl+Enter opens its filter.
• Alt+H on a row opens its history.