Solve for Grouping by Array-based Data

[Zollie]

Problem
Users don’t get useful results when they group by multi-selects, array based, or comma separated values. In the example below, three recipes that include “Apples” end up in different groups. Whereas a new user might have wished all of the records were listed under “Apples” and then re-listed under other fruits as well.

Solution Attempt
Honestly, there might not be a good solution without breaking core Airtable functionality and database best practices. In other words, by introducing (gasp) duplicate records as described above. I’m imagining a toggle under the grouping menu where a setting section named something like “split lists & display duplicate records” could display extra records (with an option to set a deliminator). Might also be nice to have a visual indication within the grid when a record is a duplicate.

So the above list would instead look like:

Apples:
    Apples & Caramel
    Fruit Salad *
    Fruit Smoothie *
Pears:
    Fruit Salad *
Bananas:
    Fruit Smoothie *

Known Workarounds
A user could just filter a view by a group category (such as Apple), but this becomes cumbersome at scale. Or someone could write a script and print customized values to a table, but this isn’t ideal if you were grouping in order to more easily edit live data.

[Bill_French]

Zollie:

without breaking core Airtable functionality and database best practices.

Ahhhhh… the downside of grid data and taxonomies, I don’t think you can present any decent approaches without escaping from the core database constraints.

You need a query tool in a custom app that transforms the data into related objects rendered in a visual. Vega is that rendering tool.

Taxonomy vs Ontology