Persistent 500 error on Custom List filter querying related collection (Steps table)

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1

App: Daily Skills Lab App ID: e60aabb0-f6b2-43ed-9a7f-5b4dc4b5ed96

Issue: A Custom List component on one of my screens (“Step By Step Cooking”) consistently returns a 500 Internal Server Error when it tries to load, with no crash on the screen itself in the builder — it only fails at runtime in the Previewer/View App.

What the list is trying to do: The list’s source collection is “Steps.” It’s filtered to show only the step matching the recipe currently being viewed. I’ve tried three different versions of this filter, and all three produce the same 500 error:

  1. Current Step > Recipe > ID — Is equal to — Current Recipe > ID
  2. Current Step > Recipe — Is equal to — Current Recipe (whole record comparison)
  3. Current Step > Recipe > Name — Is equal to — Current Recipe > Name (text comparison)

All three fail identically.

What I’ve confirmed is NOT the problem:

  • The “Create Record” action that creates a User Recipe Progress record beforehand works correctly — I can see the records being created successfully in the Database view (9 test records created, all with correct User/Recipe/Current Step values).
  • There is no current Adalo status page outage.
  • The screen itself renders fine in the builder canvas — the error only appears when the screen actually loads live data via View App / Previewer.

Network details (from browser DevTools):

  • Failing request URL pattern: https://database-red.adalo.com/databases/[app database ID]/tables/t_6ev1czgwjugxo5mg1z29qju4?... (this table ID corresponds to my Steps collection)
  • Status: 500
  • Response body: plain text “Internal Server Error” (no further detail)
  • Request includes a column_filter parameter that appears to be an encoded/hashed representation of the filter conditions above

What I’d like help with: Please check server-side logs for this app around the time of these requests to see what’s actually causing the 500 (rather than the generic message), and let me know whether relationship-based filters comparing two linked collections’ fields are expected to work this way, or if there’s a different recommended approach for this exact use case (showing one specific step from a related collection based on the currently-viewed parent record).

Thank you for your help!

2

Hi @Siena,

Welcome to the community! :tada:

Once I tried your app in the previewer, I didn’t saw any 500 errors on the network tab which all are 200 success but nothing on the screen after clicking the start button on a recipe. I can see a record gets created on a collection and no data (steps) displays on the screen.

Would you be able to share a screen recording showing us your component setup, database collections and previewer along with the network tab? (you can use Google Drive, sendspark.com, loom.com) Or else, you can simply submit a support ticket.

Thank you and have a great day!