Symptoms
The lookup icon (magnifying glass) next to reference fields is greyed out when users are trying to create a new record from a reference list.
Example:
- On a sys_user record click the lookup icon next to Department
- In the Department list view, click the New button to create a new Department record
- The Department form (in the Reference List view) shows the lookup icons as greyed out
Release
Eureka and Later
Cause
This behavior is working as expected and was an intentional change made with the Eureka release. In Eureka, the magnifying glass was greyed out with text indicating that auto-complete should be used instead of another lookup. However after Eureka, the lookup icon is simply greyed out without indicator text.
Inspecting the element shows the following information:
"Lookup unavailable in Reference Lists, use autocomplete"
Resolution
The developers made this change because opening another lookup window from within a popup window would overwrite the current popup users were originally in.
Users should utilize the typeahead auto-complete functionality from within the Reference view.
Additional Information
Related community post with this information- https://community.servicenow.com/community?id=community_question&sys_id=041f8fa1dbdcdbc01dcaf3231f9619bf