About the List View Web Part

You can use the List View Web Part to display and edit list data in your site, and to connect to other Web Parts, including other List View Web Parts. Lists are information that you share with team members and often display in tabular format. List views display this information in different ways for different purposes, such as filtering, sorting, selecting specific columns, and so on.

You can display most lists and List View Web Parts in one of two tabular views: Standard view, which is available to any user, and Datasheet view, which is a Microsoft Excel-like spreadsheet that uses the Microsoft Office List Datasheet Component and requires Microsoft Office 2003 to be installed on your client computer.

You might use the List View Web Part in the following ways:

Display list data on a Web Part Page in a tabular format to quickly sort, filter, isolate, and update the data.
Track project data in a List View Web Part and filter or sort it by a column containing a person's name or job assignment from a matching column in a connected Contacts List View Web Part.
From an Employee Basics List View Web Part that contains an employee name and ID number, look up detailed employee information, such as benefit options, family status, and medical insurance coverage, in a connected Employee Details List View Web Part.
Examine a complete customer order in two connected List View Web Parts: an Order List View Web Part that contains the order information, and an Order Details List View Web Part that contains all the line items for that order.
Visually enhance basic information about a person in a Contacts List View Web Part, by displaying a picture of that person in a connected Image Web Part, or a map of that person's business address in a connected, custom Map Web Part.

Using either Standard or Datasheet views, you can connect a List View Web Part to another Web Part, including another List View Web Part, from the Connections submenu on the Web Part menu in one of three ways:

Command on the Connection Type submenu	Description
Provide Row To	Pass a selected row of data to the other Web Part.
Provide View Data To	Pass all the data in the view to the other Web Part.
Get Sort/Filter From	Filter or sort data in the List View Web Part based on information from the other Web Part.

All the List View Web Parts at your site are usually available from the Site Web Part Gallery. When you first add a List View Web Part from a Web Part Gallery to the Web Part Page, it displays the default list view in the Web Part. To display the data you want in the List View Web Part as well as the other connected Web Part, you may need to modify the view of the list. For example, you may want to filter, sort, or group data a different way or display different columns.

You can change the list view from the custom properties List Views section of the tool pane in one of two ways:

Select a different view from the Selected View property.
Click Edit the current view to modify the current view.

Whenever you select or edit a list view, a copy of the list design is made from the original site list design and saved with the List View Web Part. However, the list data is the same.

Caution Be careful switching to a different view from the current view. You may remove changes you have made to the current view, and may disable Web Part connections that depend on columns in the current view. You are prompted for confirmation if you switch views.