Ref attributes and filter/sort

Locode
1

When a foreign (or alternate) reference form field is mapped using RefAttribute it will obviously display the specified named field, but operations against the list become unusable. Not surprisingly, the filter expects an ID value, which adds a lot of confusion from a usage perspective, but the most significant issue is that from the UI it’s not possible to find the ID of the item shown to add that as a filter.
One solution might be to have a default value with a ‘title’ attribute against those values, so hovering over the ‘friendly’ value shows the underlying ‘unfriendly’ id.
Ideally it would be nice to have the format method pass the ‘row’ value as a third parameter, so the client side function call so it can act on its own values, e.g. a User row might have the following

function Fullname(val, options, row) {
    return `<span>${dto.FirstName} ${dto.LastName} (${val})</span>`;
}

or

function Fullname(val, options, row) {
    return `<span title='${val}'>${dto.FirstName} ${dto.LastName}</span>`;
}
2

Yeah, sounds like you are starting to hit the limits of customization to the Locode interface. Like our docs and videos go through, the best place to use Locode is for rapid feedback, but there will always likely places where you need custom UIs to make the experience meet whatever specs you are building agaist.

Something we have been investing in is a set of Vue 3 components (rather than petite vue which Locode uses and is embedded). These are still under development at the moment but will be announced in next release in coming weeks.

We have a Bookings example here in the vue-mjs template, and the code used for that page is very small for the grid.

Vue 3 components are a lot more flexible, at the cost of still being more verbose than Locode customizations.

We have the NorthwindAuto test project which can be good for making changes to Locode’s main scripts if you wanted to create a PR with the desired change, if it is small and non disruptive.

Have a look at Vue 3 components as it is also what we are looking at to make a Locode UI more flexible and standard as opposed to niche like petite-vue.

At some point though, a custom UI is likely needed to get the best user experience. Let us know your thoughts on Vue-3 components. Cheers.