# CMS filter using select on csv string
**URL:** https://forum.finsweet.com/t/cms-filter-using-select-on-csv-string/2309
**Category:** Attributes
**Created:** [December 26, 2023, 8:34am UTC](https://forum.finsweet.com/t/cms-filter-using-select-on-csv-string/2309 "2023-12-26T08:34:36Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@brindeau.joachim](https://forum.finsweet.com/u/brindeau.joachim)
#### Post date: [December 26, 2023, 8:34am UTC](https://forum.finsweet.com/t/cms-filter-using-select-on-csv-string/2309/1 "2023-12-26T08:34:36Z")
Hello! 👋
I am playing around with the CMS filter.
I have 3k pages in a collection with some fields that contain arrays as comma separated strings (some are very long).
I cannot use a multi-reference field because it would largely exceed the webflow CMS item limit.
_For example, it could be:_
- **countries\_raw =** “France, Germany, Italy”
- **projects\_raw =** “raising funds, financing machines, hiring staff”
## Minimum viable solution
### Progress
✅ A multi-select checkbox that is populated using another collection.
✅ When the user selects a word, it would filter the list according to the field in the list.
❎ If the option selected is contained in the field among other options, it should still match. _i.e._ The option selected should act as a keyword search and show results.
### My project
Filtering works but only if the result only contains one choice, it’s not parsing the comma separated string. Here are the links:
➡ [Live link](https://www.fonds-publics.fr/test)
➡ [Read-only link](https://preview.webflow.com/preview/aides-subventions?utm_medium=preview_link&utm_source=designer&utm_content=aides-subventions&preview=af9dcf450264031d13f71ac86ecdd6d1&pageId=6587dca3ffa52b4640f250cf&workflow=preview)
## Comfortable solution
❎ A better solution for me would be if the options of the multi-select field where populated from the list, and not from another collection.
## Ultimate solution
❎ The very best solution would be an autocomplete field that would generate choices based on the concatenation of all comma separated values.
Thank you very much for your help! 🙏
Cheers,
Joachim
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### Author:  [@Support-Luis](https://forum.finsweet.com/u/Support-Luis)
#### Post date: [January 2, 2024, 5:44pm UTC](https://forum.finsweet.com/t/cms-filter-using-select-on-csv-string/2309/2 "2024-01-02T17:44:57Z")
Hey @brindeau.joachim!
By saying:
> I cannot use a multi-reference field because it would largely exceed the webflow CMS item limit.
Do you mean the 5-item limit for Nested Lists?
Have you seen the [CMS Nest](https://finsweet.com/attributes/cms-nest) solution?
The filtering issues come from the comma-separated categories, CMS Filter requires an exact match of text content to return a match. This will not be a limitation on Filter V2. Which is being worked on now.
Your setup looks similar to the CMS Nest option #2 which was developed for speed improvement. However, as your collection to nest is relatively small you can use the setup option #1 as this would work with your collection setup as is.
For your ultimate solution, you can take a look at the [Combobox](https://finsweet.com/attributes/combo-box) solution that provides the autocompletion functionality you are after.
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### Author:  [@memetican](https://forum.finsweet.com/u/memetican)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2024, 4:33am UTC](https://forum.finsweet.com/t/cms-filter-using-select-on-csv-string/2309/3 "2024-02-26T04:33:25Z")
> [@Support-Luis](#):
>
> This will not be a limitation on Filter V2. Which is being worked on now.
Hey Luis, super excited about this- I use FS Filter a lot on client projects. Any details on this, or do you need any BETA feedback?
---
### Author:  [@Support-Luis](https://forum.finsweet.com/u/Support-Luis)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2024, 9:14am UTC](https://forum.finsweet.com/t/cms-filter-using-select-on-csv-string/2309/4 "2024-02-26T09:14:26Z")
Hey @memetican! The Filter should be done very very soon. I’m not sure when we will have the version ready for beta testing but do keep an eye on X and the Slack channel for any news regarding this 😉