List of Values is a powerful feature that allows users to select from a pick list when setting conditions in a query. This is especially important if you want to query on codes linked to a set of products. Using the List of Values feature, you will not need to memorize which codes go to which products.

The part that I would like to focus on is Cascading List of Values. In a real world Data warehouse for example, we may have thousands of customer codes. As a business user, in order to get to the customer codes I desire, I would probably want to select my customers from a certain region. Using Cascading List of Values, I can first select which regions I want to view and then select my customers from there.

Please note that it is important to think of the most efficient path a business user can take to get to their answer. One blunder that happens with many developers is the lack of planning when creating a Cascading List of Values. Some may include too many levels which in the long run increases the response time of user selection or too few levels which would cause users to spend too much time looking for certain values.

I’d like to wish everyone who reads the blog a great and prosperous 2009! I’ve been on vacation for the last month but now I’m back so hopefully I’ll be writing articles more often

Thanks again to everyone who reads my blog and I hope that my articles have proven useful

Cheers
David