The Overview Form Editor helps you to create overview forms. The Overview Form Editor performs the following steps to create the overview form.
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Create a menu item with the Main form element item type.
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Create other menu items under the main form element.
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Create a user interface form for the main form element.
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Assign the permissions group and the application to the menu items and the interface form.
Figure 22: Design view in the Overview Form Editor
To create a new overview form
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In the Designer, select the User interface > Forms > Overview forms category.
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Select the Create new overview form task.
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Enter the basic properties for the overview form.
Table 115: Basic data for an overview form
|
Menu item |
Name of the menu item. Assign descriptive names here if possible. These are then propagated in the child structures. |
|
Caption |
Caption shown on the user interface form. The caption is used to represent the user interface form in the task view and in the form context menu of the user interface. Translate the given text using the  button. |
|
Object |
Object definition for which the form should be displayed. |
|
Parent menu item |
Parent menu item for grouping together the overview forms; usually a menu category. |
|
Product assignment |
Application in which the form will be shown. |
|
Group assignment |
Permissions group for which the form will be shown. |
|
Display columns |
Columns to be displayed on the main form element.
TIP: Use the Show column captions link to switch between column captions and technical names. |
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To create the overview form, click OK.
This displays the overview form design in the Overview Form Editor. You can continue editing the overview form.
For the other form elements on an overview form, create menu items. Create menu items for object relations you need to display frequently, and use these menu items as reference in the form elements of the overview form. You can let the Overview Form Editor create the menu items for object relations.
In the Overview Form Editor, you can create menu items directly as list elements, data elements, or as references to menu items.
To add more form elements to the overview form
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In the Designer, select the User interface > Forms > Overview forms category.
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Select the overview form then select the Edit overview form task.
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In the edit view, select the Object relations view.
All the object foreign key relations (FK), object child relations (CR), and object member relations (M:N) are displayed.
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Select the object relation that you want to display and drag and drop it on an empty element in the design view.
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Select the type of menu item you want to create. You have the following options:
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Create list elements: Creates a fixed menu item.
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Create data element: Creates a data-dependent menu item.
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Create list element reference: Creates a menu item with the Link item type and a reference to a menu item for display as a list.
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Create reference to data element: Creates a menu item with the Link item type and a reference to a data-dependent menu item.
The Overview Form Editor automatically generates the menu item’s main data. The Overview Form Editor displays the form element in its design view.
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Assign a result list to fixed menu items for displaying the list items.
TIP: Use the Create element context menu to create more menu items, links, or statistics as form elements in the Overview Form Editor's design view. In this case, enter the main data of the menu item, link, or statistics manually.
Using references to menu items
The following special features apply when you create form elements using the Create list element reference and Create reference to data element context menus.
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The reference entries under the InfoSheets.QIM.Links menu item are used.
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If the required reference entries are not yet available, new reference entries are created with the names InfoSheet.List.<table> or InfoSheet.Node.<table>.
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In the reference entry condition, a %<Table>WhereClause% variable is used.
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A variable with the Text variable type is used on the form element. A condition formulated as a WHERE clause is assigned to these variables on the form element. You can further modify this condition as required. In the Overview Form Editor's edit view, edit the variable in the Variable definitions view.
Take note of the following special features when editing overview forms.
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Use the VI_ElementNavigation form definition to create the interface form for the main form element. This form definition provides the control element for displaying the overview form in the user interface.
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Enter the name of the main form element in the Properties section of the interface form configuration data for the main form element.
Example: Configuration data of an overview form
<DialogSheetDefinition FormatVersion="1.0">
<Properties>
<Property Name="OverviewNode">VI_Person_Person_Overview</Property>
</Properties>
</DialogSheetDefinition>
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If a form element is used for mapping lists, the items are displayed with their display template. If you want a list in the display template with no more than two column names, you can use a table to create a two-column display.
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You can switch to the referenced object by clicking an item in a list. To prevent navigation to the referenced object, set the value of the configuration switch on the menu item result list to Ignore user interface forms in result list. This is useful if, for example, forms are not defined for some objects in the result list. Otherwise, an empty form is displayed.
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You can open an interface form by clicking the caption in the form element header. In the Overview Form Editor, assign the interface form to the form element. The form element must use a fixed menu item. The interface form, however, must refer to the main form element, for example, a form for assigning this object.
When you edit an overview form, it is possible to display a preview of it.
To create a preview of an overview form
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In the Designer, select the User interface > Forms > Overview forms category.
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Select the overview form then select the Edit overview form task.
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Select the main form element's table in Table in the Overview Form Editor's toolbar and select a fixed object to use for the Object preview from.
NOTE: In the Object menu, select the No object item to end the preview.
