Dynamic Lookups

Modified on Fri, 10 Oct at 2:47 PM

There are 2 types of Lookup, Data Lookup and Element Lookup.


Data lookups are used to dynamically populate existing form elements with data. 

Element lookups are used to dynamically generate form elements.


TABLE OF CONTENTS


Create a Dynamic Lookup


Dynamic Lookups can be created by clicking "Dynamic Lookups" on the left side menu and clicking the plus button in the bottom right of the screen.




Choose the Lookup type, Data or Element and the source Custom, Hosted or Built In.

You will then need to give your Lookup a Label and add the URL for the API endpoint. 

Lookups can be configured across your environments, allowing for added versioning control across your apps. 

For more on Environments, check out this article.



How to Set up


Navigate to the form builder, in the element details, there are the 'Enable Data Lookup' and 'Enable Element Lookup' switches.

Once a switch is turned on, you can select from one of your configured Lookups.



Now the element will include a lookup button to call the lookup endpoint, or for elements like autocomplete, selects, switches and radio buttons, the lookup endpoint will be called once the option is selected. 



Data Lookup


The Data Lookup feature allows form elements to be populated form elements dynamically based on the values of specific elements.

For example, I want to search on a list of playgrounds and find the corresponding location and suburb. If you already have this information available, then you can create your own data lookup to automatically populate the location and suburb based on the Playground name. 


When the lookup button is clicked, the form submission data is sent to the Lookup Sourc,e which dynamically populates the other configured form elements.





Element Lookup


The Element Lookup feature allows the form to be populated dynamically with elements based on the value of the specific element.

For Example, I want to do a stock take of a warehouse. I have a list of items I want to check are in the warehouse, but the list of items is different for each warehouse.


When the lookup button is clicked, the form submission data is sent to the Lookup Source, which dynamically populates the form with the configured elements.

In doing this, I can dynamically show the list of items based on the specific warehouse ID. Warehouse 123 has a very different list of items from Warehouse 124.






Element lookups can also be used to generate form pages and elements across those pages. 


For an example of this, check out our GitHub example here



Custom URL vs Hosted API vs Built In



When creating a Lookup, you can choose to use a Custom URL. When choosing a Custom URL, you will be asked to provide the URL for the specific API endpoint you want the form data to be pushed.


Alternatively, you can use our API Hosting service to create your own custom hosted APIs for your Lookups to point to. When selecting OneBlink Hosted, you will be asked to select an API and a route for each of your available Environments. For more on our API Hosting service, check out GitHub API CLI.


Dynamic Lookups also allow for the user to exclude Form Definitions from the Lookup payload. This will reduce the size of the lookup payload and ensure that only the form submission data is passed through to your lookup endpoint. 




We also have the option to use Built-In data as the source of our lookup. Essentially, we capture the logged-in users' information and use that as a data source for our lookup.


These are the following element names that work with Built-In lookups:


Form Element NameDescription
fullNameThe current users full name
firstNameThe current users given name
middleNameThe current users middle name
lastNameThe current users surname
addressThe current users address
pictureA URL for a picture of the current user
emailThe current users email address
phoneNumberThe current users phone number
roleThe current users role or job title
supervisorProviderUserIdThe current users supervisor's user identifier
supervisorEmailThe current users supervisor's email address
supervisorFullNameThe current users supervisor's full name
areaCodeThe current users area code
cityThe current users city
stateThe current users state
countryThe current users country
countryCallingCodeThe current users country calling code
departmentThe current users department
divisionThe current users division
bargainThe current users bargain
employeeNumberThe current users employee number
departmentHeadFullNameThe current users department head's full name
departmentHeadEmailThe current users department head's email address
usernameReturns the logged-in username
userIdReturns the logged-in user's ID
providerTypeReturns the logged-in user's provider
providerUserIdReturns the logged-in user's providers ID
isSAMLUserReturns whether the user is a SAML user (true | false)
emailVerifiedReturns if the email has been verified (true | false)
phoneNumberVerifiedReturns if the phone number is verified (true | false)
groupsA comma-separated string containing groups used to grant the current user access to approvals
zipCodeThe current users zip code
postalCodeThe current users postal code



Customise Error Messages


You are also able to add your own unique error messages. 

These are configured in the API.



Offline


Due to the lookup calling an external endpoint, this functionality will only work while online.



Example Lookup API


For information on creating your own lookup API, check out our API Hosting examples.


Get Help


If you have any questions or would like assistance with setting up your Lookups, please contact us via this support portal or email support@oneblink.io. We are happy to assist in any way we can.




Was this article helpful?

That’s Great!

Thank you for your feedback

Sorry! We couldn't be helpful

Thank you for your feedback

Let us know how can we improve this article!

Select at least one of the reasons
CAPTCHA verification is required.

Feedback sent

We appreciate your effort and will try to fix the article