Bug 150182 - Pivot Table Filter is inaccessible from main menu, and its label in context menu doesn't distinguish it from e.g. Standard Filter
Summary: Pivot Table Filter is inaccessible from main menu, and its label in context m...
Status: NEW
Alias: None
Product: LibreOffice
Classification: Unclassified
Component: Calc (show other bugs)
Version:
(earliest affected)
unspecified
Hardware: All All
: medium normal
Assignee: Not Assigned
URL:
Whiteboard:
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks: Pivot-Table Calc-UX
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Reported: 2022-07-28 09:34 UTC by Mike Kaganski
Modified: 2022-08-04 06:50 UTC (History)
2 users (show)

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Crash report or crash signature:


Attachments
A pivot table to see the difference of filtering (11.58 KB, application/vnd.oasis.opendocument.spreadsheet)
2022-07-28 09:34 UTC, Mike Kaganski
Details
Standard Filter dialog (top) vs. Pivot Filter dialog (bottom) (11.77 KB, image/png)
2022-08-04 06:39 UTC, Mike Kaganski
Details

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Description Mike Kaganski 2022-07-28 09:34:14 UTC
Created attachment 181469 [details]
A pivot table to see the difference of filtering

In Pivot Table's context menu, there's an item named "Filter...". It calls .uno:DataPilotFilter, which filters the source data used for pivot table's calculation.

It is unclear from the label that this function is different from e.g. Data->More Filters->Standard Filter. The results of applying the two different filters is completely different.

In the attached document:
1. Go to 'Pivot Table' sheet
2. Right-click inside the pivot table, and select 'Filter...'
3. In the dialog, select 'value' in first Field name, '>' as first Condition, and '9' as first Value, and press [OK]

=> The result is only one entry in the table, listing 'b' with sum of values 20, because the pivot table now only considers the rows with value > 9 on 'Sheet1', and such rows only exist for 'b'. No rows are hidden on sheet 'Pivot Table'.

4. Undo (the pivot table is three-row again)
5. Data->More Filters->Standard Filter...
6. First Field name -> 'Sum - value'; first Condition -> '>'; first Value -> '9', press [OK]

=> The result is two entries in the table visible, listing 'a' with sum of values 12, and 'b' with '26', because the pivot table uses all the data from 'Sheet1', but the rows on 'Pivot Table' sheet where values in column B are 9 or smaller are hidden (i.e., row 4 is hidden).

So it would be good to have the full item name listed for the function, which is "Pivot Table Filter", to allow user to see the difference.

Also note that the entry for pivot table filter is unavailable in the main menu: it should be listed under Data->Pivot Table.
Comment 1 Roman Kuznetsov 2022-07-28 11:23:26 UTC
>So it would be good to have the full item name listed for the function, which is "Pivot Table Filter", to allow user to see the difference.

May be better to name it like "Source range filter"?

And what about the documentation? 

https://help.libreoffice.org/latest/en-US/text/scalc/guide/datapilot_filtertable.html?DbPAR=CALC#bm_id3150792 shows the info about two different filtering methods

Anyway, I agree with Mike here
Comment 2 Heiko Tietze 2022-08-04 06:22:55 UTC
The topic was on the agenda of the design meeting.

While changing the name sounds reasonable users may be confused by the fact that both open the common standard filter dialog. So why don't we have the same kind pivot type of filtering when starting from any UI element? Given this can be changed the label would be less important.
Comment 3 Mike Kaganski 2022-08-04 06:39:40 UTC
Created attachment 181580 [details]
Standard Filter dialog (top) vs. Pivot Filter dialog (bottom)

(In reply to Heiko Tietze from comment #2)

Do you mean "remove one filtering, and keep the other" for pivot tables?

Actually, the two dialogs are different - see the screenshot. And their functions are different - and both important.
Comment 4 Heiko Tietze 2022-08-04 06:45:33 UTC
The two dialogs look identical to me, at least on the first glance. And I wonder what the point of keeping the standard filter is.
Comment 5 Mike Kaganski 2022-08-04 06:50:58 UTC
(In reply to Heiko Tietze from comment #4)
> The two dialogs look identical to me, at least on the first glance.

Indeed, they look *similar* (I wonder how one can call them "identical" with the screenshot above; precise meaning of terms is underrated). I would even say that we could *want* to make them even more similar - maybe unifying the control sizes, and - if applicable (didn't check) adding the "remove" buttons to allow flexible number of conditions...

> And I wonder what the point of keeping the standard filter is.

As demonstrated, they do a different task. And the original problem arose (in https://forumooo.ru/index.php/topic,9266) exactly because the user needed *standard filter* (to only see the results that are larger than some margin), but used the filter from pivot table's context menu for that, not realizing they are different - see how users *need* that function.

Honestly, the "what the point of keeping the standard filter is" looks very much like "what is the point of keeping Calc, when we have Math" ;)