Do your Quickbase apps rely on address information? Maybe you want your delivery crew to use Quickbase Mobile to travel to delivery locations. Or you have real estate properties you’d like displayed on a map. Perhaps your insurance adjusters would like to grab the location of an accident report. We recently released two new features that make working with addresses much more powerful. And simple. We’ve added a new Address field type and a Map report. The combination of these two features put powerful new capabilities into the hands of your Quickbase web and mobile users.
Address Fields
When you are creating a new table or adding fields to an existing table, choose the Address field type. Now, in a single field you can capture all the individual elements that make up an address: street, city, state/region, zip/postal code and country.
Once an address is filled in on a form, the field displays the address data and also displays the location on a map right below it.
If that Address field is displayed in a table report, the address is a link that quickly pops-up a map.
But the value and utility of the Address field goes beyond simply displaying the point on a map. It’s integrated with the Google Maps lookup service. So instead of typing all the address info (and maybe, like me, always spelling something incorrectly) we’ve provided a search box with the Address field. Type in a portion of the address just as you would for Google Maps and we return matches. This lookup service returns addresses worldwide.
Picking the correct address from the list auto-fills the entire address. No muss. No fuss. No mistakes. And Quickbase immediately displays the address on a map right in the form so you can validate that it’s the right place.
If you are on a mobile device and want to enter the current location, the Locate button just grabs it and fills it in for you.
Map Reports
So what can you do with that address info once you have it in your table? This is where things get interesting. Let’s take a look at our new Map report type. Building one is super simple. When you create a new report, just choose the Map type. It’s a new option in the “New report or chart” dialog.
Setting up the Map report is simply a matter of telling Quickbase which Address field to use (since you may have more than one Address field in a table, for instance Shipping Address and Billing Address). If you only have one Address field we’ll pick it for you. In this example, I’ve chosen Billing Address. You can also choose what to show when someone hovers over the location pin on the map, in addition to the address details. Choose one or two fields from your table to display. For example, maybe you want to display the customer’s name and phone number.
Because maps with too many pins are difficult to read Quickbase limits the number of records displayed on the map to 100. That means that initial filtering and sorting are important to make sure you see the right records. In this example, I’ll filter to only customers in Massachusetts. You’ll notice that even though the Address field is a single field, each individual element of the field (in this case the state) is available independently for things like filtering, formulas or displaying in columns in reports.
So… here’s what that map report I just set up looks like. You can see the customer name and phone number displayed on the pin along with the View, Edit and Get directions actions.
And of course quick search and dynamic filters work with Map reports. A couple of clicks and I can focus only on my customers in Boston or Cambridge.
Finally, our new Home page editor lets you display these map reports along side other important info and actions to create truly comprehensive and interactive dashboards for your apps.
These are just a few quick examples of using Address Fields and Map reports. For a more detailed look at using these features please check out this “Configuring Address Fields and Map Reports” how-to video. Thanks to all our customers who helped with feedback while we were designing and developing these new features. If you have more feedback while using them please let us know through Quickbase User Voice.
