New in Canvas: Customizable tables in related lists, sub-tab grouping, and actions for better navigation

New in Canvas: Customizable tables in related lists, sub-tab grouping, and actions for better navigation

Dear All,

The Canvas team has made using Canvas easier and more enjoyable with a few additional customization features that can help you design more effective detail view pages.

So, Canvas, as you all may know, is a platform with which you can customize various parts of your CRM to

  • Organize your data better.

  • Customize them for different profiles;

  • And of course, bring a whole new fresh design that is consistent with your brand. 

Here are a couple of exciting updates that can help you design more effective detail view pages using Canvas.

1. Customizable tables in related lists - which allows you to style your RL tables by adding images and a pop of color to them.
2. Introducing expandable sub-tabs. You can now group your tabs into sub tabs based on a theme, thus making navigation easier. 

Customizable tables in related lists

To start off, let's look at how you can customize your related lists table. Previously, you could only choose between static or list table templates as seen in the image below. 


While this was functional, we realized that businesses might prefer to customize their own tables. With the latest update—the Customizable Table option in the navigation toolbar—you can customize your related lists table. Options include field selection and styling. With this feature, you can add colors to rows and columns, in addition to resizing (by extending column markers), besides, adding, or removing rows and columns from your table. 


These functions are important because they'll make it easier for you to differentiate your rows and columns, expand the columns that contain more data, and add images as well.

Tab enhancements
Sub-tabs

Another improvement we've added to Canvas is the option to create a sub-tab. So imagine your record's view page has a Tab with numerous elements, namely attachments, open and closed activities, notes, campaigns, social, and more, in addition to some custom tabs. Having these tabs laid out makes it easier for you to navigate through your related lists. However, your interface may become cluttered if there are too many tabs.

Now, imagine you have these components categorized into multiple groups of the same theme. Like for instance, you combine open activities, closed activities, invited meetings, and upcoming actions under a group called Activities. Similarly, you create other groups that can either all be expanded simultaneously or one at a time - based on your preference. This will not only help declutter your components, but also put things into perspective. 

These groups that you create are called Sub Tabs, and you can perform one of the two actions on them.

Multi expand: This is the default option. When you want to open multiple sub-tabs simultaneously, you can do so by selecting the multi expand action tool. In other words, the submenus of one sub-tab will not collapse when you click on another.

Single expand: When you select this option, only its associated sub menus will expand or collapse. In instances where you've expanded one sub-tab and then clicked on another, the previous sub-tab menus will collapse before the following one expands.



So how are these Sub Tabs created?

When you add a Tab from your elements onto your Canvas view editor, you have the option of adding Custom Tabs, Sub Tabs or Related Lists.

Select Sub Tab.


Next, under your Sub Tab, you have a blue plus sign. When you click on that, you can add the Related Lists that fall under your Sub Tab theme. Like in the example we mentioned earlier, you can combine open activities, closed activities, invited meetings, and upcoming actions under a Sub Tab called Activities. 

Let us look at some other examples of components that can be grouped together as sub tabs.

Sub Tab (Group) Name
Components
Marketing
Campaigns, Visits, Social, Sales Inbox
Inventory
Invoices, Sales Orders, Purchase Orders, Quotes, Vendors, Price Books, Products


Use Case - I 

Education Industry

Student Information 
Student Documents, Degree, Courses, Thesis Guides, Placements 


Use Case - II

Real Estate

Contact's Property Information 
Properties, Documents, Notes, Quotes, Invoices

That is all for this announcement. Let us know your feedback in the comments below. For more details on Canvas, check out our help document. 

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