Best Design Approach

[MatthewB]

If one has a contact list of 1100 companies grouped by service category it is useful to see a datasheet or list view, and a form view side by side. Then you can select from the list and see the company and employees in the form view. What is the best selection of controls to achieve this? One ideally wants a form view that can be updated. The one approach I have seen uses a query and a list box, but the form data would not update. It seemed odd as well that the form data required VBA to populate from the query. Your thought?

A Novice
Thanks

 

[arnelgp]

use Split Form (no or minimal code required).

 

[MajP]

This one is popular and is more customizable than the standard split form.

Emulating the split form

Like many users of this forum, I abandoned split forms a long time ago as I found them difficult to adapt if you want to modify them in any way In a recent thread another user wanted to keep the idea but to emulate it using a single form with a continuous subform. See this thread...

www.access-programmers.co.uk

 

[MajP]

You can reconfigure the above approach and put list part and detail part side by side instead of top to bottom.

 

[Eugene-LS]

use Split Form

Newer use Split Form!
Hard practice has shown that they are glitchy.
...
Dear @arnelgp - please do think before advise ...

 

[arnelgp]

Newer use Split Form!
Hard practice has shown that they are glitchy.

what is glitchy about it?
you think and explain!

 

[Eugene-LS]

what is glitchy about it?
you think and explain!

Split Form has duplicate fields at the top and bottom, and events of objects works on the top only - and that's not all
This confuses the users and doesn't let them work properly
Is that enough for you?

 

[arnelgp]

Is that enough for you?

if it is Confusing to you, don't use it.
what i am Suggesting to the OP is possibility.
I am not Enforcing anything as if it is the Ultimate Absolute solution!

 

[Eugene-LS]

I am not Enforcing anything as if it is the Ultimate Absolute solution!

Good words!

 

[arnelgp]

obviously you Liked post #3 which is an emulation of split form
and on your own word will confuse the user because of the layout?

 

[Eugene-LS]

obviously you Liked post #3 which is an emulation of split form
and on your own word will confuse the user because of the layout?

No, I have my humble opinion based on experience, and I am ready to prove it by examples
...

 

[GPGeorge]

Love your taste in music.

 

[arnelgp]

another suggestion.

 

[isladogs]

@MatthewB
if you do decide to try my emulated split form (ESF), the current versions are available from my website:

Emulated Split Form

The emulated split form was created as a project to overcome the difficulties inherent with the built-in split form supplied with Access

www.isladogs.co.uk

The article outlines some of the ways in which the ESF provides more functionality than the standard split form

 

[Pat Hartman]

I prefer a filterable but not updateable list form with an editable single form popup. The popup is a dialog so code in the list form stops while the popup is open. That means that on the line after the OpenForm method, you would have a Me.Requery so the list form gets updated with any changes to the popup. If having the list form loose your current position is a problem, there are ways to solve that problem.

 

[nycazngrl89lw]

• Stage 1: Empathize—Research Your Users' Needs. ...
• Stage 2: Define—State Your Users' Needs and Problems. ...
• Stage 3: Ideate—Challenge Assumptions and Create Ideas. ...
• Stage 4: Prototype—Start to Create Solutions. ...
• Stage 5: Test—Try Your Solutions Out.

 

[gemma-the-husky]

If one has a contact list of 1100 companies grouped by service category it is useful to see a datasheet or list view, and a form view side by side. Then you can select from the list and see the company and employees in the form view. What is the best selection of controls to achieve this? One ideally wants a form view that can be updated. The one approach I have seen uses a query and a list box, but the form data would not update. It seemed odd as well that the form data required VBA to populate from the query. Your thought?

A Novice
Thanks

irrespective of the answers given here, the real issue is to think carefully about the data you have, and structure it in such a way that the solution is more easily found.

eg. If you have 1100 companies in your system, do you ever want to see all those companies, or do you want to first select a category or even multiple categories of those companies, to reduce the sample size. eg, if you can process the 1100 by a selection that reduces the number by a factor of 10, twice, you now only have 11 companies, and it's going to be easier to present those 11 in a more user-friendly manner.

You really don't want a list of 1100 companies. It's just too many to use comfortably, I think.

 

[Pat Hartman]

@gemma-the-husky I don't think @MatthewB is with us any more. He posted the question April 8th and never came back.