Sorting on Visible Rows Only

**dwilliiiiii** · 06-02-2010, 08:20 AM

Haven't been able to find an answer to this anywhere. I have a table with hidden rows. Each hidden row is associated with the visible row immediately on top of it (matched by column L). When I sort on column B, the hidden/associated rows are sorted too, and they lose their adjacency to the row they're related to (because the hidden rows have different values in column B).

Is there any way to only sort on visible rows, keeping the hidden row association adjacent to its visible counterpart?

Sample file is attached...

**masteff** · 06-04-2010, 12:51 PM

1) Can a person have more than one row w/ a score on it? What if they take another form/test/whatever these are?

2) It would be helpful if each person has a unique ID that can be sorted (even if it's just their full name combined like =TRIM(lname&" "&fname) (replacing the lname and fname with the proper cell references)).

3) Especially if you start having other values in Form1 (see #1 above), you could use autofilter to restrict to all the same Form1's and then sort based on anything you want. When you're done, you simple set the filters back to "all" and re-sort based on your unique ID as suggested in #2 above.

**dwilliiiiii** · 06-05-2010, 12:12 PM

Thanks for your reply, Masteff. Yes, there could be more than one row with a score in it. The table would contain the results from a webform, and would regularly be appended with new individuals, as well as returning individuals, who would already be in the database.

Adding the unique ID is a good idea, and I'll include that. The problem with autofilter, though, is that after running a few filters, the outline (pluses and minuses on the left) get messed up, and lose their association to the rows they were originally outlining for. Not sure why that is.

I was hoping to be able to sort on grade and still have the ability to use the outline for duplicate records. The point of keeping the duplicate record under the outline is that you could easily see the "history" of the individual to whom the record belongs by opening (+) and closing (-) it. The outline itself is automatically created every time you "filter uniques" using an XLA plug-in called DigDB (great tool, btw... digdb.com).

Clearing and re-establishing the outline after a sort is not practical if there are thousands of records in the database. However, here's what I'm going to do (just figured this out)...

I'm going to create unique IDs, as you suggested, and clear the outline. After I've appended a bunch of new records, I will sort on ID, then run the "filter uniques" using DigDB. This will automatically re-apply the outline view. Because the "filter uniques" creates the outline automatically, it doesn't matter how many records are in the database.

That solves it for me. Thanks for getting me thinking in a new direction! This was driving me crazy for days.