End user hide/change column positons on nettalk forms and browses at runtime

[ozejohn]

My end users are used to changing the column positions and hiding columns at runtime on clarion browse windows. We also use the old layoutmanager template to allow them to hide and move fields on forms at runtime.

Since the nettalk web server form/browse window displays are built at runtime it would be possible to hide columns and change their order based on user input. If this could then be saved in a table to become a user profile linked to login security then all users could customise their browse/forms. This would reduce developer support by reducing the need to customise the app with programming.

I can see that other users have done things like this on nettalk browse and form windows already. Would anyone like to post a tip on what they have done in this area? Also has anyone made up a little template or class to do this yet?

[ozejohn]

Bruce,

I am thinking of writing a extension template that :-
1. captures the programmers input for forms and browse windows as well as help tips etc and logs it into a data file.,
2. works with a browse/form set that lets the supervising user/dealer to edit the settings on the data file and save it under different login user profiles.,
3. Then at runtime reading that data and using it to adjust fields displayed, field size, sorting allowed, tool tips etc.

This would make the programmers work more like setting up interface objects. To an extent at deployment time the exact mix of allowed objects could be put together for each customer or each user group. It could allow us to taylor sites to an extent without having to change the program as much. It would also generate the technical documentation for the apps. Making them partly self documenting.

A. Is this the kind of thing you where thinking of for Nettalk 5. If so I will wait a while. If not I will have a go at it myself.

B. Does this sound like a nightmare to build. In which case I will drop the idea.

[Bruce]

Hi John,

Fundamentally what you're talking about is easy enough. And it's not as big a deal as you make out. All the fields in the form, and the browse have conditional options. So by using the right conditions it's easy to turn fields/columns on and off. These conditions would typically just be checking a data switch stored in a file.

I wold imagine that a user would have access to this data via a very simple interface (typically checkboxes) that allow them to turn columns on and off.

That's the easy bit. The harder bit is in formatting the result. The fancier the format, the more impact adding, or removing fields will have. In simple browses and forms, not too much impact. But with more complexity things could get a bit hairy.

Re-ordering columns is a slightly different animal, and slightly more complex to pull off. Ideally the user should be able to drag-and-drop columns into different orders.

To answer your question though this is all on the planned list for NetTalk 5. However I've not implemented it yet, so no promises are being made at this point.

Cheers
Bruce

[ozejohn]

Bruce,

Ok since you are planning to do it anyway in Nettalk 5 I will leave it for now.

[oeb]

Has this been implemented (using NT 6.51)?

[Bruce]

No not in NT6.

I have implemented it in my Windows apps at the top of this year, so it's something I'm looking to port into NT7 as well.

cheers
Bruce