Filters

Watch this video or read the text below to learn about filters in Herdly. Please note that this video was made before advanced filtering was available on mobile devices.

When you look at the animal list in Herdly, by default it will show all current animals. You can quickly find a specific animal by typing part of its tag number in the search field, but often you want to filter the list of animals by different criteria. For example, you may want to see all the animals at a certain location or from a certain group. Filters will help you do this. Filters work a bit differently on the computer and on a mobile device, but have equivalent functionality.

On a Computer

To open the Filter window, click the Filter button or use the keyboard shortcut Command-Shift-F (Mac) or Control-Shift-F (Windows). When used with an animal list, this window will have a Common section and an Advanced section. The Filter window can also be used with child lists, but they only have the functionality described in the Advanced section.

When you choose more than one criteria to filter the list by, you can use the control at the top of the window to determine how the criteria are combined. There are two options:

1. All. This is the default option and only find records that match all of the criteria. For example, if your criteria was that an animal's status had to be current and their gender had to be Female, the list would only include animals that were both current and female.
2. Any. This option will find animals that match even just one of the criteria. Using the same example as above, it would show all animals that were either current or female.

At the bottom of the window, you have the option of whether to include archived animals. By default archived animals are not shown.

Common Filters

When used with an animal list, the Common section will show some commonly used fields to filter by on the left side of the window. If you want to filter by one of these fields, select the value you want to filter by from its popup. Leave it set to Any to not filter by that field.

Ordering Results

You can sort a list by clicking on a column header, but this only allows you to sort on one column at a time. The Filter window provides a way to order the list by multiple columns. When called from an animal list, the ordering controls will be on the right side of the window in the Common section. For other lists, it will be shown at the top of the Filter window. Ordering works the same way for either type of list.

You can order by up to three columns. Click a popup to change the field you want to order by. You can also choose whether to sort forward or backward. Repeat this process for each level you want to use. If you don't want to use a level anymore, simply choose None from the list or click the Remove button, depending on the situation.

Advanced Filters 

In an animal list, there is the option of adding additional criteria by using the Advanced section. This functionality is all that is available for other types of lists.

To filter by a field, click the + button and choose the field. It will be added to the criteria list. To change the condition, double-click the cell in the Condition column and choose from the available options. There will be different types of conditions to choose from depending on the field type. For example, date fields let you filter based on the month, the year, a date range, etc. Text fields let you do a contains search, among others.

Once you've chosen the condition, double-click in the Value column to change the value. The type of value you can enter here will depend on the type of field and the condition you have chosen. Some combinations allow you to enter a second value by double-clicking in the last column.

If you want to add another field, repeat the process. There is no limit to how many fields you can use as search criteria and it is okay for the same field to be listed twice, each with different criteria. To remove a field, select it and click the - button.

When you have set the filter up the way you want, click the Apply Filter button.

Note that as you add common or advanced filters, the number of filters that are active are indicated in the window. And you can quickly reset all the filters (including the sorting options) by clicking the Reset Filters button.

On a Mobile Device

You can apply filtering in the animal list on a mobile device by tapping the Filter button available in the top right corner of the Animals screen. The same list of common fields found on the desktop will be shown at the top of this screen. Tap one and select the value you want to filter by. You can filter with several fields at the same time. To remove a filter, set its value to Any.

Below the common filters is a list of options which allow you to change the condition type between All or Any or determine whether archived animals are included, matching the same logic as explained above in the Computer section. Below the is a list of sorting criteria and below the sorting criteria is a list of advanced filters. Just like on a computer, you can add as many sort criteria and advanced filters as you like.

To add one, tap the + button and then choose a field and, if available, additional information about that field. Do remove a sort criteria or advanced filter, click the - button and then tap Delete.

When you are finished setting the values, tap the Done button.