Editor fields & datasets

<EditorFields> holds the create/edit form fields for a view. Each child is named after its field type. This page covers the field types and their attributes, plus the <Select> dataset system. The smart Required/Disabled/Hidden/Allow/Deny attributes and ValueExpression are introduced here but documented in full on Column & field expressions.

Base attributes (all field types)

Name (required), Label, Required, Disabled, Hidden, Allow, Deny, Placeholder, DefaultValue, Width (1–12), and ValueExpression.

Required / Disabled / Hidden are “smart” attributes — each holds either a literal ("true"/"false") or a row-context expression. Allow / Deny are field-level security (whitelist / blacklist who may edit a field), server-enforced on submit. ValueExpression computes the field’s value. All of these are covered in detail under Column & field expressions.

Per-field events

<Events>
  <On Type="Change">           <!-- Checked | Change | EnterPressed | Blur | RowEntered -->
    <Script>field.value = (field.value || '').trim();</Script>
  </On>
</Events>

Field types

Element	Type-specific attributes
<Text>	TextType (SingleLine|MultiLine|RichText|Email), MaxLength, Mask, AutoComplete, AutoCompleteSource
<Number>	MinValue, MaxValue, DecimalPlaces, Step, ShowSpinButtons
<Boolean>	DisplayType (Checkbox|Switch|RadioButtons), TrueLabel, FalseLabel
<Select>	Searchable, Multiple, AllowClear, MaxSelection, ControlType (Select2|ModalSelector), EmptyOptionText + a <DataSet>, and optional <Columns> / <ExtraMappings> (see below)
<DateTime> / <Date> / <Time>	Format, MinDate, MaxDate, ShowCalendar, AllowManualInput (the element name picks date/time/both)
<Attachment>	Accept, MaxFiles, MaxSize (bytes), Multiple, UploadPath
<Password>	MinLength, MaxLength, HashedParameterName
<Sequence>	Format (required), Scope (required)
<CartTable>	inline editable grid — see CartTable

<Sequence> editor fields

The next number is generated at submit and supplied as @{Name} — but it’s only stored if <InsertSql> actually inserts that column (e.g. INSERT … (InvoiceNumber, …) VALUES (@InvoiceNumber, …)). Leave it out of <EditSql> so it’s assigned once and not regenerated on edit.

Under the hood the value is a cooked token ({Resource}|{Format}|{Company}|{Guid}) that a per-entity AFTER-INSERT trigger expands. The trigger is set-based over the whole inserted batch — it reserves one contiguous block per (Format, Scope) group and assigns numbers with ROW_NUMBER(), so a bulk import numbers thousands of rows with a single counter update (not one per row) and is gapless (a rolled-back insert un-reserves its block). #N zero-pads to N digits; a bare # defaults to width 2 (INV-# → INV-01). The padding lives in one place (FormatSequenceNumber).

<Text TextType="RichText">

Renders a WYSIWYG editor (Summernote, jQuery-based) and stores the content as an HTML string, so back it with a large column (an entity <String> with no Limit → nvarchar(max)). The editor is lazy-loaded — jQuery + Summernote ship in a separate chunk fetched only when a rich-text field first renders. The HTML is DOMPurify-sanitized on every change and again on display (GenieView renders it via the genie-richtext-readonly container); see SECURITY.md. See the Description field on the Products view (sample/Inventory/models/views/Products.view.xml) for a working example. If the editor assets fail to load it degrades to a plain multi-line <textarea>.

Select <DataSet>

A <Select> field draws its choices from a <DataSet>. The Type picks the source.

<Select Name="CustomerType"><DataSet Type="static">
  <Option Value="Individual" Text="Individual" />
  <Option Value="Business"   Text="Business" />
</DataSet></Select>

Type	Source
static (or options)	inline <Option Value="" Text="" />
csv	comma-separated values in the element body
sql	a SELECT … AS Value, … AS Label query in the body (+ LoadOnStart)
model	Schema="" Model="" — reuses the static options of a <Select> field on that Genie entity: the target entity must declare a <Select> whose Name equals this editor field’s Name, and its <Option>s become the choices. For a lookup that lists another entity’s rows, use a sql dataset (SELECT Id AS Value, Name AS Label FROM …), not model.

SQL datasets — Value / Label / extras

A SQL dataset aliases the identifier as Value (submitted, hidden) and the display text as Label — or Text (the Select2 { id, text } convention is also accepted). If neither Label nor Text is present, the first column that isn’t Value is used as the label. Any other columns are “extras” — surfaced to the client for the modal table and <ExtraMappings>. The query self-filters using two server-injected parameters: @SearchText (%term% while typing, % when the box is opened with no filter) and @CurrentValue (the currently-selected value, for re-resolving its label). Session parameters (@SessionUserId, @SessionCompanyId, …) are injected too. View mode, and every field render before the dropdown is opened, resolves the stored value to its label through the same query — multi-selects resolve each comma-joined value.

<DataSet Type="sql">
  SELECT Id AS Value, Name AS Label, Email, Phone
  FROM   Sales.Customers
  WHERE  IsDeleted = 0
    AND  (@SearchText = '%' OR Name LIKE @SearchText OR Email LIKE @SearchText
          OR CAST(Id AS NVARCHAR(20)) = @CurrentValue)
</DataSet>

Always include the = @CurrentValue branch

On an EditorFields SQL dataset, always include the = @CurrentValue branch. A request that carries a bare CurrentValue with no active search text — the call a dataset-backed <Select> fires on every render just to show the current value’s label, before the dropdown is ever opened — is not treated as “browse with no filter”: the server passes @SearchText a pattern that cannot match any real row, so the label resolves solely through your = @CurrentValue equality (an indexed point lookup on the PK, however large the table) instead of scanning/returning the entire dataset. Omit that branch and a large table is safe from the scan, but a stored value’s label will no longer resolve (the control falls back to showing the raw value). @SearchText = '%' still applies to genuine browsing — the dropdown opened with an empty search box — and to a CartTable’s CurrentValues (plural) resolve, which has no per-request narrowing unless the dataset opts in.

Control types

Every <Select> renders as a styled, always-searchable dropdown — there is no raw native <select>. ControlType="Select2" (default) and Searchable="true" are accepted for back-compat but no longer change anything: a dropdown is searchable regardless, and a dataset-backed one searches server-side (LIKE via @SearchText) while a static-option one filters client-side. ControlType="ModalSelector" instead opens a picker dialog showing the dataset rows in a table with a tick column on the left and a debounced search box at the top. Set Multiple="true" on any of them to select more than one value — stored comma-joined, capped by MaxSelection, and shown in the control as non-colored tag pills (remove a value by reopening the dropdown and unticking it). AllowClear (default true) adds a clear (×) button to a single-select; EmptyOptionText/Placeholder set the empty-state text.

<Columns> (ModalSelector table)

Optional. Chooses, labels, and orders the columns shown in the ModalSelector table. Omit it and the table shows every dataset column except Value.

<Columns>
  <Column Name="Label" Label="Customer" Width="40" />  <!-- Name = dataset column; Label/Width optional -->
  <Column Name="Email" Width="35" />
  <Column Name="Phone" />
</Columns>

<ExtraMappings> (autofill other fields)

Optional. When a row is picked, copies columns from that row into other form fields — e.g. choose a customer and auto-populate read-only email/phone fields. (For a multi-select, the most-recently ticked row is applied.)

<ExtraMappings>
  <Map Column="Email" Field="CustomerEmail" />  <!-- row column -> target field name -->
  <Map Column="Phone" Field="CustomerPhone" />
</ExtraMappings>

Worked example: sample/Inventory/models/views/Products.view.xml demonstrates every field type, including a model dataset (reusing the Product.Status enum), a sql lookup (Category), a ModalSelector with <Columns> + <ExtraMappings> (Supplier → autofill email), a multi-select, and RichText.