updated interface

app/controllers/dashboard_controller.rb

@@ -1,27 +1,25 @@
 class DashboardController < ApplicationController
   def index
     joint_column = 'joint'
-    # Grab distinct values for dropdown filters
     @available_joints = Joint.distinct.pluck(joint_column)
-
-    # Fetch initial records
+    @available_data
     @records = filter_records
 
     respond_to do |format|
-      format.html # Renders app/views/dashboards/index.html.erb
-      format.json { render json: @records } # Returns filtered data as JSON for JS
+      format.html 
+      format.json { render json: @records } 
     end
   end
 
   private
 
   def filter_records
-    if params.include?(:joint)
-      records = Joint.all
-      records = records.where(joint: params[:joint])
-      records
+    # Using .where(joint: params[:joint]) handles both present and nil values gracefully
+    if params[:joint].present?
+      Joint.where(joint: params[:joint])
     else
-      []
+      # Return empty array if no joint selected to avoid loading thousands of records
+      [] 
     end
   end
 end