Create a "catalog" from a SharePoint list

Brass Contributor

I have gotten a request to create an internal "catalog" ... users would submit a request for hardware or software, and when they select the hardware/software from a dropdown list, they would see a description of that item. I really have no idea how I'd do that, and wondered if anyone here has done it, or knows where I can find STEP-BY-STEP instructions to create it. I have SOME technical skills, but I can't create much from scratch, I'll need detailed instructions. Thanks in advance!

4 Replies

Basically you'd need at least 2 SharePoint lists for this scenario. 1 list capturing all required hardware/software data and another 1 capturing users' requests. In the users' requests list you can use a column of type Lookup to the hardware/software list. This will render the dropdown that allows users to select the hardware or software item from the list. 

 

In defining your lookup column you can specify the column you'd like to see when selecting the item from the lookup list, typically this will be the title. In this case the title of the software or hardware item. You can also specify which other columns from the lookup list should be visible in the List View after saving an item with a lookup value. This way you could include your description. This description however won't be visible while adding a new Item.

 

As for the Description, you might need to do some form of customization to render the description right after selecting the hardware/software from the drop down. Traditionally this could be done with some JavaScript attached to the collumn using JSLink. JSLink functionality however is not available yet in modern lists so you might consider implementing your own "New item" experience for the requests list. This custom "New Item" experience could be implemented in many different ways...

 

Hope this helps!

 

 

That all sounds great, but I was looking for step-by-step instructions.

I already checked out this site about creating a product-centric website, but I wasn't able to get past enabling a list as a catalog. That feature was activated in my site settings, but first I saw the error "It is not possible to retrieve crawl information as the system is configured in a way that limits access to this information." And there was a message about term sets, and I just gave up.