common form structures (1 Viewer)

[accessuser1023]

I like building apps that generally display data in the format presented by continuous forms. (one record per line). However, I also like providing separate forms for adding records one by one. There are so many options for this stuff (adding, deleting, editing). But I'm really into patterns...especially those that are the least risky.

What kind of set ups do some of your guys use here for this? Most of the people I work for don't care what happens as long as it works. I try to patternize literally everything I do because that's the way the world has been set up (technically) anyway.

Anyone have any thoughts on this by chance? Looking for ideas on what other people do. What I do here may seem fairly bland, but I care more than anything about minimizing risk of corruption and accidents as much as possible. And if that means sacrificing the "cool" GUI stuff than so be it.

Comments anyone? thanks.

 

[Pat Hartman]

My approach is more organic. Certain things lend themselves to single form view and others are better as continuous forms so it really depends on what I am trying to do. The one thing that is standard is that all forms are bound to queries and those queries always have selection criteria that limits the number of rows returned.

Since I started using A2010, I've been trying very hard to use themes for controlling how forms and reports look. Early in the development, I'll change themes every once in a while to see what the user likes best. Once he settles on one, we go with it. Once you adopt the theme methodology, you will need to think long and hard about changing any formatting because once you change something, it might look funny if you end up changing the theme again.

I also use built-in functionality unless the user specifically wants something custom. So, for example, the vast majority of my forms use the built-in navigation buttons. I like being able to add captions though. - that was actually my idea back in the beta for A2007 when I was an MVP. I create a separate section in my training manual that describes how tools such as sorting and filtering work and the zoom box. I also use the old Switchboard form although I have modified it somewhat to suit me. It looks different in each app because I choose different backgrounds and different fonts and colors. I am starting to branch out though since A2010 finally offers nice formatting options for buttons.