Wrapping an ORDERBY() around a Ref_Rows() causes the inline "New" button to loose it's context

AppSheet AppSheet Q&A
1

By default, when you have a Ref_Rows() formula this creates an inline view with a “New” button that allows you to create related records.

When you tap the new button, the reference context is carried over into the following form (automatically creating the reference link).

But if you wrap an ORDERBY() formula around that ref_rows, the relation is no longer carried over - you have to manually select the reference record.

In fact, it seems that any modifications to the Ref_rows causes the auto-ref connection to fail.

It’s long been known that if you mess with the system generated Ref_Rows, the system will generate another one (which you then have to hide/deal with), but the ref-connection has always continued to work.

@Adam

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I just uncovered this in my App as well. This is a big obstacle to me for a critical feature I am trying to deliver, so I am going to open a support case. I recently worked through a similar (converse?) issue in which the ORDERBY(REF_ROWS) combination causes cascading deletes to leave orphan children when deleting the parent record. While I admittedly don’t really knowing WTH I am talking about, my guess is that the root cause of this is somehow similar to that. I’ll let you know what I find out.

Please let me know if you ever got any answers or found any workarounds to this.

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