I’m building a mentoring app. Basically, I have a column in the Users table to identify their role (Mentor or Mentee). Both Mentor and Mentee can arrange a mentoring session, which is a record in the Sessions table. Sessions table has columns like session_date, mentor_name, mentee_name, session_notes. Assume that Mentor-Mentee is one-to-many relationship.
Refer to the attached screenshot. I have 2 tabs for adding a mentoring session: one for Mentors and one for Mentees (only one tab is visible according to your role). The difference between the 2 tabs is the default values when adding a session. For example, if I’m a Mentee, my Mentor value is defaulted, so I don’t have to type anything.
The issue is the ‘add item’ form which appears when you click the + button. This form is replicated across the 2 tabs. In other words, I cannot configure this form so it has different default values depending on the tab. Is this the expected behavior or is this a bug?
Do both tabs refer to the same underlying sheet/table? Some layouts are deeply integrated to the sheet/table, so depending on your setup, I would say that it is expected behavior for the Add Form to be the same for both tabs.
There’s a handful of ways to approach it. If both tabs are tied to the same sheet, then I would personally only have a single tab instead of two. I never use the built in Add function. Instead, I usually use a details style layout with an inline list and a floating form button. You could have two different forms and continually show the correct form button based on the user role.
Hi Jeff,
Thank you for your speedy reply and your suggested workaround – that works for me.
Yes, both tabs refer to the same underlying table. I have a different opinion about the Add Form. I made 2 tabs because I want Mentors and Mentees to have different list layouts. For example, Mentees are grouped by name, whereas Mentors are not (because of the one-to-many relationship). I’m able to implement these different layouts for the 2 tabs. So, if I’m able to do this, I would argue that I should be able to differentiate the Add Form for the 2 tabs too.
Do you know what is the best way to share my opinion to the Glide team?
I second Jeff. The native Add Form seems to be integrated to the source sheet, so tabs (with list displays) with the same source sheet have the same Add Form. I see what you mean: because one has two tabs with the same underlying source sheet and yet one has displayed the information differently – different lists and options (filter, group, visibility) – one might expect the Add Forms to also be adjustable. The way I remember that it isn’t so is that the list options (filter, group, visibility) only has a bearing on how the data is displayed, not on the data itself. The Add Form is more of a data backend feature, whereas options are more frontend UI features.
By putting all of your components for your 2 roles in one single screen (tab), I believe you will need to adjust the visibility options for each individual component. In a way, you are building two screens within one and using visibility on components to toggle between one and the other. I personally have gotten used to this approach and use visibility on components (more so than on tabs), as I like the idea of creating the layout of a screen within the confines of one single tab (instead of two versions of a screen). It’s only a question of perspective, I believe your approach to create 2 separate tabs would also work.
(For this reason, it would be practical to be able to save a component’s visibility settings to apply the same setting to other components )
Hi @nathanaelb thank you for the taking the time to explain it. This community has been immensely helpful and responsive. I’ve only used Glide for <1 month and I’m very encouraged to see the strong community here.
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