Reference numbers: part numbers, document codes and form numbers Free

A datasheet has a part number. A safety data sheet has a document code and a revision. A form has a form number. An exam paper has a paper code. Until now the only place to put it was the title — "DOC-0208 Terminator Pro brochure" — which made titles hard to read and the number impossible to sort by.

Every document now has a Reference number field. It is free, optional, searchable, and available as a column.

Free — included in every FileDeck install.

Set it

On the document’s edit screen, in the File box, under the file itself: Reference number. Any short text — DOC-0208, SDS-2026-14, ISMD80D-075, Form 3971. Save the document.

Importing? The Pro CSV import takes a reference column, and the CSV export writes one.

Show it

Add the Reference column wherever you choose columns: the chips manager under Documents → Settings → Display, the shortcode’s columns attribute, the block, or the Elementor widget’s column picker.

[filedeck columns="reference,title,categories,date,link"]

The column is sortable — click the heading — in the table and folders layouts, including libraries large enough to run in server mode. (Grid and gallery cards show a fixed set of details, not columns.) Documents with no reference show a dash.

Search it

Visitors can type a reference into the library’s search box and find the document — in the library search (inline and server mode) and in the Pro content search. Partial matches work: 0208 finds DOC-0208. (The site-wide ⌘K quick search matches titles, not the reference field.)

FAQ

Is the reference number shown to visitors who cannot open a restricted document?

Yes — it is treated like the title, which a padlocked row also shows. It identifies the document; it is not its content. If the number itself is sensitive, leave the field empty and keep it in the description, which restricted visitors never see.

Can I make it required, or give it a format?

Not in the free field. Pro’s custom fields let you define a field with a type, a validation pattern and a filter of its own. The reference number is deliberately the simple case: one free-text field that most libraries need and none should have to configure.

Does it have to be unique?

No. FileDeck does not enforce uniqueness — two revisions of the same datasheet can share a reference, with the date column telling them apart.