Often the answer to one Choices field should populate or filter the options available in a subsequent field.
We call this “cascading choices”, where a parent Choice drives one or more child fields.
You can easily add cascading behaviour using the Form Designer.
Our platform is smart enough to handle many levels of cascading choices too – i.e. where one field filters another, which in turn filters another etc.
Note that you must be using a Data Source for your child field(s) in order to add cascading functionality to your Form.
We recommend using Data Sources on all your Choices fields – it is a simpler approach and means that common lists of options such as “Yes/No” can be shared and reused across fields and Forms.
Lets assume we want the following cascading behaviour:
Country field
-> State field
So when the user choses a country, then the State field should only show states for that selected country.
Now lets assume the State and City Data Sources are as follows:
| Country Code | Country Name |
| AU | Australia |
|
etc.. |
etc.. |
| US | United States |
| State | State Name | Country Code |
| NSW | New South Wales | AU |
| QLD | Queensland | AU |
| WA | West Australia | AU |
| AL | Alabama | US |
| AK | Alaska | US |
| etc… | etc.. | etc… |
To follow along with this recipe, head to the Data Sources area of the web portal and create two new Data Sources: Country and States.
We have attached two CSV files at the bottom of this article containing the sample data.
Use the Upload option found on the Data Source -> Rows page to load the CSV data rows into the relevant Data Source.
The steps to implement cascading behaviour using the above example data and setup is as follows:
1. In the Form designer, add a Choices field and name it Country.
2. Select the Country field – this will show the properties for the field on the right hand side.
3. Find the property titled “Answer Choices” and select “Data Source”.
This will show a bunch of options for Data Sources.
4. In the drop down list of available Data Sources, find the Countries Data Source and select it.
- The first filter drop down shows the columns available on the States data source.
Choose the “Country Code” option. - The second filter drop down shows the logical operations we can use for filtering.
Choose the “equals” option. - The third field is a text field where you can enter the name of another field or just a static value.
We want to filter by the Country field’s answer, so enter {{Country}} into the text box.
Your handiwork should look like the screenshot below:
Awesome, you’re done 🙂
