Custom document fields & advanced filtering Pro

FileDeck Pro lets you add your own fields to documents — Department, Policy number, Publication date, Document owner, Jurisdiction, Status, and anything else your library needs — then show them as columns and let visitors filter by them. Define fields once under Documents → Fields; every document editor then shows those fields, and any library can display and filter on them.

FileDeck Pro — this feature is included in all Pro plans. See pricing

Define your fields

Go to Documents → Fields and add a row per field. Each field has:

• Label — what editors and visitors see (e.g. "Publication year").
• Key — the internal name used in columns and CSV headers (e.g. publication_year). Leave it blank to derive one from the label.
• Type — one of: text, number, date, dropdown (single choice), multi-select, URL, user, or yes/no.
• Options — the choices, one per line, for dropdown and multi-select fields.
• Categories — restrict a field to documents in specific categories, so a "Policy number" field only appears on policies.
• Flags — mark a field Filterable (it becomes a filter on the library) and/or Searchable (its value is matched by the library search box).

Once saved, every document editor shows the applicable fields in the Document File panel, and you can fill them in as you add or edit documents.

Show fields as columns

Add a field to any library as a cf:<key> column. Under FileDeck → Settings → Columns, every defined field appears in the column picker; add it and it shows in the table (and as a grid attribute), sorted by value — dates and numbers sort correctly, not alphabetically. You can also list columns directly in the shortcode, e.g. [filedeck columns="title,cf:department,cf:publication_year,link"].

Filter by any field

Fields marked Filterable become filters in the library’s controls bar:

• Dropdown, multi-select, yes/no, user and text fields show a faceted dropdown with live counts next to each value — "Finance (12)", "Approved (30)". Picking one narrows the list, and the other filters re-count to show only what’s still available.
• Number and date fields show a min / max range — "revision between 3 and 5", "effective on or before 2026-03-01".

Filters combine, and the current selection is saved in the page URL, so a filtered view can be bookmarked or shared. On large libraries the filtering and counts are computed on the server, so they stay fast no matter how many documents you have.

Import and export fields in CSV

Custom fields ride along with FileDeck’s CSV import and CSV export. Each field is a cf:<key> column in the CSV — export writes it, and import reads it back. Multi-select values are separated with |, yes/no is 1 or blank, and a user field accepts an ID, username, or email address. This makes bulk-editing field values in a spreadsheet straightforward.

Using Advanced Custom Fields (ACF)

If your site already uses Advanced Custom Fields, FileDeck reads its values directly — an ACF field named department is available as a cf:department column and filter with no extra setup. To turn ACF field groups into FileDeck fields (so they get labels, types, and filters), open Documents → Fields and click Import fields from ACF. FileDeck mirrors the field groups shown on documents; it doesn’t replace ACF or reimplement its editor.