Table Sort Deletes Xref Markers

[Bob_Niland]

FM 7.1 (Unix), and just seen in a test using FM9 (Windows 7).

If you have a table with Cross-Ref markers in it, and you sort the table, and Frame finds anything to sort, the markers vanish. Any chance this was fixed in FM10? Or is there some trick I don't know about?

My guess is that Frame's table sort is being done as a Copy-Paste-Delete, rather than by Cut-Paste. Cut typically preserves any Xref markers in the text. Copy typically does not (evidently to avoid ambiguous duplicates).

For narrative discussion of components, we use one or two appendix or reference page tables with a column for call-out number* (an auto#), SKU, and formal database descriptor (as we may need any combination of these elements). Each cell is tagged with a marker of type Cross-Ref, containing the table ID, column ID, SKU text and descriptor text.  This creates a nice pull-down menu of SKUs in Special > Cross_Reference.

These tables are often created incrementally, adding parts as needed. To avoid adding parts already present, the tables are kept in sorted order. So new entries have to be entered manually at their relative table rows, because table-sort nukes the markers.

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Edit: This issue has been known about since FM5.5. It apparently affects only markers of type "Cross-Ref". Temporarily renaming those (a MIF hack) insulates them from sort destruction, after which you need to rename them back. That's inefficient for just adding few new rows. It might be worthwhile where an entire existing large randomized table needed sorting.

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* yes, we could combine the c/o# with another column.

[Be.eM]

If I remember correctly, this was already fixed in FM8. FM9 also works as expected in this regard.

Bernd

[Bob_Niland]

If I remember correctly, this was already fixed in FM8. FM9 also works as expected in this regard.

Have you tested it?

I began my post with a sentence including:

"... and just seen in a test using FM9 (Windows 7)"

I won't be able to retry until tomorrow, but yesterday, on FM9 Win7-64SP1, I created a small document, with table and Xref markers.

If the table didn't need sorting, the markers survived sort.

When I made a change that would require re-ordering, the marker symbols vanished after table sort.

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I'd be delighted to be mistaken.

[Be.eM]

What a bummer… you are right, it's still broken in FM9. I didn't think of that, because I've always been using the FrameScript table sorting, which preserves the markers.

Sorry for any confusion

Bernd