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Data Organizer - designing form
[Go back to the previous step - creating database ]
To create a new form we need to switch to the design view.
1) Click the Design button in the main tool bar.
Picture 1 "Switching to the design view"
You are now in the design view. The list is empty - there is no form defined yet. Let's create
one.
2) Click the New button in the context toolbar. The New form dialog box shows up.
Name of our form should suggest its purpose (what we will store inside it).
3) Type in name of the new form - country - and click the OK button.
Picture 2 "Creating a new form"
Data Organizer creates an empty form and displays it immediately.
We already know what kind of information we want to store in our database. Now, we need to
create fields for each piece of information and add some labels to describe those fields.
4) Select the Edit box button from the context tool bar and then click somewhere in the form.
Click again to add the second edit box.
5) Now select the Combo box button from the context tool bar and click somewhere in the
form.Click again add the second combo box.
Picture 3 "Adding edit boxes and combo boxes"
6) Let's give our fields some useful names.
Switch to the arrow tool, select any edit box. You should now see all properties of the edit box
on the right side of the design view.
Click the current name of the editbox in the Value column and rename it to "Country", select
the other edit box and name it "Capital". Do the same for combo boxes giving them names
"Continent" and "Language".
Picture 4 "Renaming fields"
Now that we have all required fields we need to add some labels to describe them.
7) Select the Label button from the context tool bar and click somewhere in the form. Click
three more times to have four different labels in the form. Switch to the arrow tool again and
rename each label so that it describes one of the fields have we added before.
We have all controls and labels placed randomly in our form. We need to layout them.
8) First drag labels so that they create one column in the left top corner of the form, then drag
each field so that it is next to the appropriate label. You do not have to be accurate.
Your current layout should be similar to the one shown below.
Picture 5 "Adding labels, laying out fields"
9) Press and hold the Ctrl key. Click each field in the right column starting from the top one.
When all fields are selected click the Align left button and then the Even vertical spacing
button in the context tool bar.
Picture 6 "Laying out controls"
Now all fields in the left column are aligned to their left border and spaces between them are
equal.
10) Click anywhere outside of any control or label to lose the current selection. Press and hold
the Ctrl key again and select the first a field in the right column and then its label in the left
column. Click the Center vertically button in the context tool bar.
Picture 7 "Laying out labels"
Repeat this operation for other label-field pairs.
11). Let's align labels to the right side.
First click somewhere outside of any label or field - this will destroy the current selection. Next
press and hold the Ctrl key and click each label starting from the top most one. Click the
Align right button in the context tool bar.
Picture 8 "The form after laying out all fields and labels"
Our form has nice layout at this point. Now we need to initialize our controls.
12) By default all fields of our form will be visible in the list of items. We want to see there only
a country name and its capital.
To make this happen select Continent and Language fields (use Ctrl button for multiple field
selection) and then change value of the Description property from True to False in the
properties pane.
Picture 9 "Specifying properties of controls"
13) Select the Continent combo box. In the properties of the field click the value cell in Values
row. An edit box with a button will show up. The edit box is empty because there are no values
yet. Click the button to invoke the Value list dialog box.
In the Value list dialog box type in name name of each continent and then click the Add
button. When you are done use the OK button to close the dialog.
Picture 10 "Specifying values for a combo box field"
14) Select the "Language" combo box and launch the Value list dialog box (in the same way
as described above). Add following values to the list: English, German, French.
At this point our form is done, we can switch back to the preview view and start using it.
15) Click the Exit button in the context tool bar, you will be asked to save your changes.
Answer Yes.
Picture 11 "Saving the form"
16) Click the Preview button to switch to the preview view.
Picture 12 "Switching back to the preview view"