Dot-walking examples

Access fields on a related table from a form, list, or script by dot-walking. This topic includes examples of the different ways that you can dot-walk.

List fields

You can dot-walk to related fields in a list, such as the field list in a filter. This example demonstrates how to filter the Incident [incident] table by the company of the caller who registered the incident.

When you open the list of fields that you want to filter, you see the list of available Incident table fields. The reference fields are followed by the related fields. For example, Caller is followed by Caller > User fields, which means that Caller is a reference field, and the related fields are user fields on the Caller record. If the related fields are not present in the list, you would select Show Related Fields at the bottom of the list.

When you select Show Related Fields, the menu reloads to display related fields.

When you select a related field, the menu reloads with the fields of the related table.

When you select Company under Caller → User fields, the field then becomes Caller.Company.

The following example shows where you are in the dot-walk. Each selected reference is stored at the top of the fields menu, and the number of dots preceding the field label indicate how many dots from the initial record the user has reached.

The example shows that the user is at Incident.Caller.Company. You can return to higher levels in the hierarchy by selecting fields located at the top of the menu. For instance, selecting Incident fields returns to the list of incident fields.

The related fields can be removed by selecting Remove Related Fields at the bottom of the list.

Condition builders

You can make a detailed query on a table by dot-walking in the condition builder.

To dot-walk in a condition builder, first select Show Related Fields on the fields menu. This action allows you to add fields from related tables to your query.

The following GIF shows how you would dot-walk fields in a condition builder to find all Incident records assigned to one specific user, Beth Anglin. In the example, the user navigates to Incident > Open and then opens the condition builder. In the fields menu, the user first selects Show Related Fields and then opens the fields menu again to select Assigned to → User fields. The user opens the fields menu again to select Last name. The user builds the following condition: [Last name] [is] [Anglin]. After the user selects Run, the Incident list displays only the records assigned to Beth Anglin.

List collectors

Note:

Adding new fields via dot-walking by filling out the Create new field section ("A" in example) in the Name field ("B" in example) is not supported. Adding unauthorized fields and adding fields against recommendations via dot-walking may result in unexpected behaviors in the platform.

When selecting a list of fields from a list collector (for example, when you are configuring a form), you can dot-walk to fields from other forms.

To see which fields are reference fields and can be dot-walked, look for green fields with a plus symbol.

Once a reference field is highlighted, the expand icon () appears above the add icon.

Selecting the expand icon opens the list of fields from the related list in the Available pane. The following example shows that the Assigned to fields were selected. The previous lists of fields appear at the top of the list.

Once the field is added to the Selected pane, it appears with its full dot-walked syntax. The following example, shows that Assigned to.Active has been selected.

Scripts

You can dot-walk within a script by invoking the dot-walk syntax. This functionality requires a knowledge of JavaScript.

For scripts that run on the server side, such as business rules, it is necessary to add current.

The following script, for example, is a scripted approval rule that requests an approval from the manager of the user who opened the ticket.

try{
  current.opened_by.manager;
}
catch(err){}

For scripts that run on the client side, such as client scripts, current is not necessary. For instance, the following Highlight VIP Caller script runs on the client side.

function onChange(control, oldValue, newValue, isLoading){
  //wait until there is a valid record in the field
  if(newValue){ 
    //get the caller object so we can access fields
    var caller = g_form. getReference('caller_id');
    var callerLabel = document.getElementById('label.incident.caller_id');
    var callerField = document.getElementById('sys_display.incident.caller_id');
 
  //check for VIP status
  if(caller.vip == 'true') { 
    //change the caller label to red background
    //style object is CSSStyleDeclaration, style names are not standard css names
  if(callerLabel) 
    document.getElementById('label.incident.caller_id').style.backgroundColor = 'red';
 
  //change the caller's name field to red text
  if(callerField)
     document.getElementById('sys_display.incident.caller_id').style.color = 'red';
  } 
    else { //not a VIP, remove temporary styles if(callerLabel)
     document.getElementById('label.incident.caller_id').style.backgroundColor = '';

    if(callerField)
      document.getElementById('sys_display.incident.caller_id').style.color = '';
    }
  }
}

Variables

Often, you can add variables into templates, notifications, or other forms where a value is being called from the form.

For example, ${assigned_to} is the variable for the Assigned to field.

As shown in the example, you can dot-walk to fields on the original record of any reference field. It is possible to dot-walk to any field on the assigned_to record, for example, ${assigned_to.manager}.

When you dot-walk, you can have a longer chain if you need it, as in this example: ${assigned_to.department.manager.mobile_phone}.

Sometimes, you can select this variable from a tree picker.

Tree pickers

The tree picker interface has an expandable, hierarchical view that you can use to look up the following items:

• Configuration Items (CIs) that are subordinate to another, higher-level CI.
• Members of a certain group. For example, you would use a tree picker to look up a user in the Service Desk group.
• Reference elements for any hierarchical table. A hierarchical table is any table that has a parent field pointing back at itself. The Group [sys_user_group] table, for example, would be considered a hierarchical table because certain groups are children of parent groups.

The following example shows how you would use a tree picker to assign an Incident record to a user in the Database group.

You would first navigate to any Incident record and then enter Database in the Assignment group field.

In this example, the Database group is a parent group with multiple child groups under it. When you select the search icon ( ) next to the Assigned to field, a window displays reference fields in the Database group.

Reference fields have the expand icon (+) next to their name. Clicking the + expands a list of the fields on that referenced field. In this example, expanding the Database Atlanta or Database San Diego fields opens a list of user records within each child group.

You would select any one of the user records to add it as a value in the Assigned to field.

Note:

You can configure the tree picker to pick up to 1,000 nodes when you configure the glide.ui.group_heirarchy.max_nodes property. To set the property, open the Dictionary attributes for the field, and add tree_picker=true to the Attributes field. If there are multiple attributes, use a comma to separate them without any spaces between.