Global Filters
The global filter restricts the information you see in MinistryPlatform to one congregation or parish at a time.
You can grant users access to a single congregation/parish or multiple ones. If there are no global filters configured for a particular user, they will be able to access information for all congregations/parishes.
Global filters only apply to the pages or the sub-pages (tabs) that you configure. Sub-pages do not inherit global filters from the parent page.
Users with access to multiple congregations/parishes can change the current filter at any time using the drop-down list at the top of the Platform.
In the Batch Manager Tool, global filters only apply to the selection of congregations/parishes, programs, and events when you create and edit batches and donations. Global filters do not affect donors on a User record, although you can search for them.
Enable and Disable Global Filters
To completely disable global filters, clear the Global Filter Page field on the Domain record. To re-enable global filters, set this field back to Congregations. Use Refresh Cache in the About dialog box to make changes to take place immediately.
Configure Global Filters
You can add a global filter to any page or sub-page, as long as you can track its records back to a congregation/parish using the Table Lookup Convention. To configure global filters, enter information in the Global Filter ID Field on the Page or Sub Page record.
Examples
- Households are closely related to Congregations, so you can express global filters as
Households.[Congregation_ID]. - In contrast, Contacts don't directly refer to congregations. However, using Table Lookup Convention, you can express the global filter as
Household_ID_Table.[Congregation_ID].
How Global Filters Apply
To apply global filters to any page or sub-page, you must explicitly define the Global Filter ID Field. If you add an expression to one page, it does not affect another page. For example, if you filter the Pledge Campaigns page, it does not affect the Mission Trips page.
- Saved selections, including selections transferred from other pages, sub-pages, or users. Global filters limit records available to be selected.
- Searching inside tools.
- Data grids inside sub-pages, unless explicitly defined.
- Filtered page and filtered sub-page – Donations are typically filtered based on batch congregation. If you have a sub-page of donations, you'll want to add the global filter ID.
- Filtered page but unfiltered sub-page – A diocese may want to filter the All Sacraments page so that parish staff only see sacraments for their parish. But when they look at the Sacraments tab on a Participant record, the diocese may want all sacraments to show, no matter which parish the sacrament was performed at.
- Unfiltered page but filtered sub-page – A church may want the Activity Log to show entries for all campuses. But, for certain sub-pages, they may want to filter by campus so that campus staff only see activity that occurred related to their campus.
Use Cases
Global filters can greatly benefit churches with multiple locations. They allow staff members to focus on only their relevant congregation(s)/parish(es), rather than all of them. The limited results in the data grid help staff to focus on caring for their members.
Alternately, a staff member can access all congregations/parishes, but switch their current filter throughout the day to accomplish different tasks. For example, Susan may apply one global filter to email all small group participants from the South Campus, then switch filters to quickly email all donors from the Downtown Campus.
Troubleshooting
If an "ambiguous column" error appears after you apply a global filter, the field name was not fully qualified. Specify table.column in all cases.
Assign Global Filters to Users
- To grant a user permission to all congregations/parishes, don't apply filters.
- If you grant access to the *Not Assigned congregation/parish, the user can see records with an empty Congregation field. This is applicable only when Congregation is not a required field (for example, in Households).
- All congregations/parishes show in the drop-down list, regardless of their end date.
- In the navigation menu, click .
- Open the record of the user you want to add a global filter for.
- On the Global Filters tab, click New User Global Filter.
- Select the Congregation or Parish from the drop-down list.
- Click Save.
- To add multiple congregations/parishes for this user, repeat these steps.