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Cascading Choices (also known as Parent-Child)

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 behavior 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: 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.

Let's assume we want the following cascading behavior:

    Country field

         -> State field

So when the user chooses a country, then the State field should only show states for that selected country. Now let's assume the State and City Data Sources are as follows:

Country CodeCountry Name
USUnited States
CNChina
AUAustralia
StateState Name Country Code
NSWNew South WalesAU
QLDQueenslandAU
WAWashingtonUS
ALAlabama US
AKAlaskaUS
 etc...etc..etc...

The steps to implement cascading behavior using the above example data and setup are 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.
  5. Add another Choices field and name it State.
  6. Repeat steps 2-4 on your State field; this time you want to select the States data source.
  7. While still on the State field's properties, you should see a "add filter" link just below the data sources drop-down. Click this link to add a new filter.
  8. You'll now see three fields displayed that let you define how the filter should work. What we want to do is have the rows in the States data source be filtered according to the Country Code selected in the Country field.
  • 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:

Now if you save the Form and set it to be in Test mode, you can try it out on your device. You should see that once you choose a country, the State field is automatically filtered to only show the States rows where the Country Code = the selected country.

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