Not as advertised with drop down boxes

[M. Swartztrauber]

Hello and thanks again for the help,

I have a drop-down field with about 30 rather verbose entries. I need
to repeat those fields (content-wise)about 16 times in a non-repeating
table and would rather not put them all in by hand.

I'm not using a database, so attempted to use the "Look up values in a
form's datasource" option. To my complete surprise, the target field
seemed to only want to display the single drop down option selected in
the datasource field.

How do I get to see all the options at once? Would changing the
datasource field to a listbox fix that? And, what if I did make a
referenceable XML document out of the options, how do I do that?
Infopath Help seems to give no clues as to what form (table form,
comma-delimited, columnar, etc.)the entries must be.

Thanks

 

[Michelle]

The easiest way to accomplish what you are trying to do would be to create an
XML file that contains all your data (list entries), then include that XML
file as a secondary data source. Use the secondary datasource to populate
your drop down list. The drop down list should still be bound to your field
in the Main DOM, so when a user picks a value, that value will be captured in
the Main DOM.

If you need more details let me know.
Michelle

 

[Michelle]

Just in case, here is a helpful link
http://www.infopathdev.com/nuggets/#Populating a Drop-Down List Box via a Secondary Data Source

 

[M. Swartztrauber]

Hi Michelle,

Thank you.

On these things, I find I'm often missing some basic info.

1) Should this xml document containing the variable list be an
infopath document or can it be a word or excel xml document? Does one
of those work out to be easier to do?

2) When I create the list, does it have to be in a particular form
such a column, a comma-delimited list, in a table, a single-column
table oriented vertically, or something else?

3) Can I put all my different lists in one document?

4) How do I point the form to the pertinent list of
variables-especially if I CAN use one xml document to host several
lists?

Thanks again!