#view-formatting 8 articles

• A date in a group header is the reader's display string, not a dategotchas / lists@group.fieldData of a Date field is text in the reader's locale; reformat only when the shape matches
• A formatter renders empty in the tab you are iterating in — verify in a fresh tabgotchas / listsAfter many REST writes the working tab shows even valid formatters blank while a fresh tab renders them; one tab per version, a scratch view, and simple formatters on fragile lists
• A non-web protocol in a formatter href silently drops the whole elementgotchas / listsms-word: in a formatter link removes the element with all children, per item, no error; open-in-app = openContextMenu
• An empty Date field is not '' — blank dates render as overduegotchas / listsBlank dates fall through to "overdue" and turn rows red; test .displayValue
• Formatting length() is for arrays — on a string it wrecks the expressiongotchas / listsString length via indexOf(str + '^', '^'), or the expression collapses to empty
• Gallery cards render from tileProps, not from formattergotchas / listsThe documented top-level formatter is ignored; the card lives in a nested, undocumented tileProps.formatter. Layout and card must go in two separate writes (PnP or REST/SPFx)
• View formatting drops CSS gradients — use a solid background-colorgotchas / listsbackground is not on the style allowlist and a gradient in background-image did not survive either; a white initial on a gradient avatar turns invisible, so use a solid background-color
• View formatting JSON can't contain < or & — XmlException on savegotchas / listsIt's stored inside the view's schema XML; reverse the comparison and nest if()