Records Sorting Broken - Ordering Completely Busted/Incorrect for Certain Fields

[Dreadknux]

I've come across a really weird issue with IPB's record sorting - nearly every user-sortable option is defaulted to displaying records in descending order, instead of ascending where it actually makes sense.

I made a test database, with some custom fields, using the default IPB theme, to show you what I'm talking about (and to make sure it wasn't just me going mad!! 😄 )

This is the default view for my database. I have a 'Position' numerical field, and I have the database set in options so that a user will see the records in order of position (from lowest number to highest number). Every time a user clicks out of this particular category, and re-visits this category, they see the above. Working as intended. So far, so good. Although I'm not entirely sure why that "sort_cms_custom_database.7.field_48" entry is also appearing in the dropdown menu (perhaps a bug? As 'Position' is in fact Field 48 in this database [7]).

This is what the user sees if they decide to sort the records by Title instead of the default 'Position' view. As you can see, the order of the records are in reverse. Nobody on Planet Earth wants to filter records alphabetically from Z-A! Why is it doing this? And there appears to be no way for a user (or admin via ACP) to switch this from descending to ascending as it should be...

Similar things happen when a user sets the sorting by 'Launch Date', a custom Date field that should be ordered oldest > newest. But instead it is ordering from newest > oldest.

Even worse, if a user decides to switch the sorting back to 'Position' (the default) after switching it to another option, the order isn't even ascending or descending. It's completely out of whack. The user will need to back out of this category/go to another page, then return to this listing in order for the default 'Position' sorting with correct ordering is visible again.

Using Custom Sorting doesn't work either. As you can see, Publish Date has things set from oldest > newest, but this is one of the only fields where I would actually like it to be in reverse (for databases such as a news database, where you should always list the newest-published records first in a listing). But it seems that this could be down to the sorting option conflicting with another option, Start Date (not sure what this is? Is this meant to be the Publish Date of a record? Why is it called Start Date)?

I should point out that some sorting options are working correctly. As a summary;

Working Correctly:

• Last Comment Date
• Highest Rated
• Most Commented
• Most Reviewed
• Most Viewed

Not Working Correctly:

• Title (ordering from Z-A, should be A-Z)
• Last Updated (random order, should be most recently updated at the top)
• Position (when re-selected; number custom field; random order, should be in numerical order from 1-4)
• Launch Date (date custom field; ordering from newest date > oldest date, should be oldest date > newest date)

I'm sure this is a bug and I'm not going completely crazy, it'd be great if there was some acknowledgement of this from IPB Staff so it may possibly be fixed in the next mini-update? It would be great for improving the user experience.

Perhaps for the future, an option in ACP > Pages > Database > Fields can allow for default sorting options for custom fields (and availability for users as a sort option - I might not want users to be able to sort using Launch Date, for example, but still allow them to see the value on listing or display pages), that might be very helpful. But for now, I think custom field sort ordering and Title sort ordering are the more pressing things to fix.

EDIT: I just noticed that this topic from Sonya also exists, covering similar things - this reply from @Marc Stridgen seems to suggest that the above will be fixed... if you could confirm that Marc that would be really appreciated, thank you. 🙂 

 

Edited May 24, 2022 by Dreadknux

[Jim M]

47 minutes ago, Dreadknux said:

I just noticed that this topic from Sonya also exists, covering similar things - this reply from @Marc Stridgen seems to suggest that the above will be fixed... if you could confirm that Marc that would be really appreciated, thank you. 🙂 

These bugs mentioned in the topic you pasted are solved in 4.7.0 which is currently in Beta. You're welcome to test this if you wish.

[Marc]

This issue has been resolved in 4.7.0 which has recently been released. Please upgrade to that version to resolve this, and of course, let us know if you are still seeing any issues.

[Dreadknux]

Hi Marc

Sad to say I have upgraded to 4.7.0 and am still seeing the issue. Here is the page as-is (default ordering set to 'Position' at ascending order):

Then, when I change this ordering to Title, expecting it to be in A-Z alphabetical order, I get Z-A reverse order instead...

Finally, if I then switch back to 'Position', expecting to see the same level of ordering as in the first image above, I instead get the list presented in reverse Position order...

The only difference with the 4.7 upgrade is that, when I now choose 'Custom' and specifically select 'Ascending Order' for things like Position and Title in the dialog box, the system listens to that command and actually applies it. But it shouldn't require this additional step to correct the ordering. And when I move off the listing page and return to it, the whole problem reappears.

This particular database is using stock Pages/CMS template files and hasn't been modified in any way.

Edited July 11, 2022 by Dreadknux

[Marc]

22 minutes ago, Dreadknux said:

Hi Marc

Sad to say I have upgraded to 4.7.0 and am still seeing the issue. Here is the page as-is (default ordering set to 'Position' at ascending order):

Then, when I change this ordering to Title, expecting it to be in A-Z alphabetical order, I get Z-A reverse order instead...

Finally, if I then switch back to 'Position', expecting to see the same level of ordering as in the first image above, I instead get the list presented in reverse Position order...

The only difference with the 4.7 upgrade is that, when I now choose 'Custom' and specifically select 'Ascending Order' for things like Position and Title in the dialog box, the system listens to that command and actually applies it. But it shouldn't require this additional step to correct the ordering. And when I move off the listing page and return to it, the whole problem reappears.

This particular database is using stock Pages/CMS template files and hasn't been modified in any way.

Thank you for bringing this issue to our attention! I can confirm this should be further reviewed and I have logged an internal bug report for our development team to investigate and address as necessary, in a future maintenance release.