Sorting in the library window

dstillman

(Actually, while we're breaking the rules, there actually is a way we could manually set a direction arrow in inactive columns. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like we could set it to the actual arrow that's used there normally, which is generated in a deep dark place in Mozilla code, and I don't particularly want to fake it, since the native arrow is different on different systems.)

bwiernik

In absence of a better option, being able to set a secondary sort choice would be much appreciated. For the benefit of some of the people in my lab who are not very comfortable with computers, I still think having a separate Sort button in the toolbar, in addition to the button in the tree view, would be helpful.

I don't think that having persistent secondary sort choices for different primary columns would be particularly confusing. In most cases, people probably won't realize it's happening, but will appreciate it (I imagine most of the time, people have a persistent preference for secondary sort order).

adamsmith

I agree it's not easy to find - but that's because the button to add columns is hard to spot in the first place, something which a future GUI update could address.
But I do think it's a good place for that option. Not sure whether it's better to have this persistent of depending on the primary search. I think persistent may be less confusing, but changing it depending on the primary category addresses issues like what to do when primary & secondary are the same.

One GUI issue is that the menu is getting kind of long, though. I'd move some columns over into the "more columns" submenu (suggestion: Journal Abbr., Accessed, Library Catalog).

dstillman

OK, a little something for everyone in my last commit: configurable column-specific secondary sorting, configurable fallback sort fields, a cleaner column picker menu, and a preference to restore sorting by the exact Creator string only (which should be faster for some libraries). Available now for testing (which it could definitely use) in the 4.0 Beta and targeted for 4.0.21.

adamsmith

working well so far. Two questions:
1. What's the direction of the secondary sort? Does it change with the primary sort?

2.

a preference to restore sorting by the exact Creator string only

not seeing that - where is it?

dstillman

1. What's the direction of the secondary sort? Does it change with the primary sort?

Yes, it's the same as the primary sort.

not seeing that - where is it?

Sorry, hidden pref only: extensions.zotero.sortCreatorAsString, defaulting to false.

JonEP

Hi, once I set the hidden preference, where do I look for the secondary sort option? Is it available in the Firefox browser version?

Thanks.

**EDIT: Found it! the little window-paney thing (column selector icon I think) in the upper right of the central pane. Works great - am now sorting books by publisher and then date, to see all the books in my collection from a certain press, in chronological order. Excellent.

adamsmith

if you mean the Firefox add-on, then yes. Click on the little table icon at the top right of the middle panel.
Secondary sort isn't available online on zotero.org