Advanced link editing features

Simple links define the relationships between a specific field in a source record and a specific field in a target record. The Find and Fill options perform in a straightforward manner. A link query is built based upon a search argument, which contains the value of a field in the source file and the name of a field in the target file. These fields need to be Unique key fields for simple linking.

The system provides extended flexibility to define complex link expressions. For example, you can:

Search for	Example	Results
A single word	`cat`	Topics that contain the word "cat". You will also find its grammatical variations, such as "cats".
A phrase. You can specify that the search results contain a specific phrase.	`"cat food"` (quotation marks)	Topics that contain the literal phrase "cat food" and all its grammatical variations. Without the quotation marks, the query is equivalent to specifying an OR operator, which finds topics with one of the individual words instead of the phrase.

Search for	Operator	Example
Two or more words in the same topic	`AND` `and` `+` (plus symbol) `&` (ampersand)	`cat AND dog` `"cat food"+milk` `"cat food"&"dog food"`
Either word in a topic	`OR` `or` `\|` (pipe)	`cat OR dog` `cat \| dog`
Topics that do not contain a specific word or phrase	`NOT` `not` `!` (exclamation point)	`NOT cat` `! dog`
Topics that contain one string and do not contain another	`^` (caret)	`cat ^ mouse`
A combination of search types	`( )` parentheses	`cat + (dog \| mouse)` `cat \| dog + (! mouse)`

Define a specific query that uses more than one field to form the link query.

Specify the record list format that should be used when the link query finds more than one record.

Define a variable, rather than a specific name, to be used as the target file.

Manipulate the value of fields by using link expressions.

Specify that particular fields are copied from the target file to specific fields in the source file during the Fill operation without a requirement for identical field names.

Include multiple non-keyed fields on the link line structure of a keyed field, enabling those fields to be copied to the source form along with the data retrieved from the keyed field query.

Note Advanced link features are not available when using Virtual Join.

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