Math, Money and Tables on Joomla!

If you want to present data neatly on your Joomla! blog, then you cannot go wrong with tables. Droptables for Joomla! has received two quickfire updates letting you do more with tables on Joomla! In Droptables’ latest update, new functionality accompanies finer details, giving you more control over your data.

Default table organization for Joomla!

The first two new introductions to Droptables are meant to help you show your data just the way you intend by using pagination and default sorting. The former is meant to help you condense big data chunks into manageable pieces for your Joomla! audience. The latter allows you to give prominence to the data that deserves it the most.

The two options are snuggly available close to each other under the Format menu when editing tables. Pagination has to be enabled first, and gives you the freedom to choose how many rows to show at a time.

Pagination is particularly useful if you are trying to display copious amounts of data. In such cases, overwhelming the user is the last thing that you want. This feature lets your users digest the information slowly, and navigate freely or jump to specific pages.

Complementing pagination is default sorting. Whether you apply pagination or not, giving certain rows priority over others is only natural. Sorting saves your Joomla! users the headache of trying to figure out which columns are the most important in your data by putting the most relevant information right on top.

Droptables now lets you define how to sort the data, allowing you to exploit your data’s potential. The sorting options are just above the pagination options in the Format menu, and let you choose not only the column to use to order records, but also the inherent ordering: ascending or descending.

And if you want to give your users even more control, you can toggle the frontend sortable data. With this switch toggled, users will be able to choose how they want to sort data. But it is not only table and row organization that has been boosted with the latest update to Joomla! Expressibility has improved a lot too with currency formats and advanced mathematical expressions.

Currency formats

Needlessly to say, money and tables go together. For example, you can use tables to list products or different subscription tiers. The latest version of Droptables arrives with a new type of format to facilitate working with currencies on Joomla!

To format cells as currencies, select the cells or a column and click on Currencies, again from the Format menu. From the popup, you can pick the currency symbol or insert your own, and set its position: before or after the number.

The most interesting aspect of currencies is how Droptables handles the columns marked as money. In fact, Droptables considers currencies just like any other column with numbers. You can paginate rows with currencies, sort by monetary amounts, format rows with alternate colors and apply even more Droptables functions from the Theme and Format menus.

You can also, for example, create charts out of currency columns like you would with any other numeric data. Simply select two columns, including one containing currency, and then create chart from data using the Chart menu. Back in the table editor, you can even use currencies with the recently-improved mathematical expressions.

Advanced Mathematical Expressions

Money and mathematical expressions go together just as well as tables and currencies. Previously, however, Droptables had been ill-equipped to cater for this pair. The newest version of Droptables is a step in the right direction and lets you do more with your financial figures. The new calculation functions are: DATE, DAY, DAYS, DAYS360, OR, XOR, AND.

In fact, it is now possible to use mathematical expressions with money just like you would with normal numbers. To use them, just input your expressions as usual and Droptables automatically handles all the behind-the-scenes tasks, ignoring currency symbols and carrying out the operations as usual.

Data is no good if it does not tell a story. Whether splitting your data, ordering it or performing mathematical expressions, the latest update to Droptables lets you tell your story with whatever narrative you want to follow.

It is also important to note that Droptable offers awesome tables that doesn't just have math logic but are also responsive so you can check and use it on any device.

If you want to start using tables on Joomla!, check out Droptables here.