Create bookmarks to display favorites in a public (non sign-in) app

[Gary_P]

In a public app (no user sign-in), I want to create a way for users to bookmark a small number of items from a table that they can later reference as their favorites.

Initially, I thought of using a behavior, like ticking a star for the item to trigger an action that changes the USER SETTINGS so they could be stored on the local device. Those settings could later be used to create a filtered slice from the table with only those selected items.

However, after poking around the forum, it appears that currently there is no way to use actions to trigger changes to user settings.

How else can I create a way for users to bookmark and create a favorites list? Please help me if you know the expression as well.

Thanks

[Marc_Dillon]

Public app does not have access to USERSETTINGS. Nor is this particularly within the capabilities of a Public plan app.

The only way to build expressions based on the current “user” (in quotes, because it is not exactly the user), is to use CONTEXT(“Device”).

help.appsheet.com

CONTEXT()

Information about the running app.

Your favoriting action could store data in a table, associated with the current device.

[Gary_P]

I have three tables: USERS, ITEMS, and FAVORITES.

These are the necessary columns in each (for simplicity). The unique key is the first field in each:

USERS (UUID)

ITEMS (ItemID, Title, Description, UUID)

FAVORITES (FavID, ItemID, UUID)

Favorites are referenced to Items using the column ItemID. Items and Favorites are referenced to Users through UUID. In the items table the UUID would be the user who created the item and in the Favorites table it would be the user(s) who favorited the item.

Thanks to Marc for putting me on the right track. I have created a users table. I can use the
CONTEXT (“Device”) to capture a unique identifier for the device and save that as the primary key in the user’s table.

I’m just not clear on the strategy. How would the app check to see if the UUID exists, and if not, create a new user from his UUID? Also, how would this event ideally be triggered? Through an action (such as bookmarking an item), a workflow (such as a change in the data of a table? etc). Could this happen each time the app is launched?

I was unsuccessful at creating a slice from the Items table that uses the referenced Favorites ItemID for the current CONTEXT (“Device”) = UUID.

Any insights would be most helpful.

[Marc_Dillon]

I don’t have time currently for a long reply, so I’ll just say that you’re essentially referring to an “onboarding” process. You can search that term in this forum

[adufresne]

@Gary_P Did you ever figure this one out? I have a similar use case I'm trying to solve for.