Alpha Software Mobile Development Tools:   Alpha Anywhere    |   Alpha TransForm subscribe to our YouTube Channel  Follow Us on LinkedIn  Follow Us on Twitter  Follow Us on Facebook

Announcement

Collapse

The Alpha Software Forum Participation Guidelines

The Alpha Software Forum is a free forum created for Alpha Software Developer Community to ask for help, exchange ideas, and share solutions. Alpha Software strives to create an environment where all members of the community can feel safe to participate. In order to ensure the Alpha Software Forum is a place where all feel welcome, forum participants are expected to behave as follows:
  • Be professional in your conduct
  • Be kind to others
  • Be constructive when giving feedback
  • Be open to new ideas and suggestions
  • Stay on topic


Be sure all comments and threads you post are respectful. Posts that contain any of the following content will be considered a violation of your agreement as a member of the Alpha Software Forum Community and will be moderated:
  • Spam.
  • Vulgar language.
  • Quotes from private conversations without permission, including pricing and other sales related discussions.
  • Personal attacks, insults, or subtle put-downs.
  • Harassment, bullying, threatening, mocking, shaming, or deriding anyone.
  • Sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, ableist, or otherwise discriminatory jokes and language.
  • Sexually explicit or violent material, links, or language.
  • Pirated, hacked, or copyright-infringing material.
  • Encouraging of others to engage in the above behaviors.


If a thread or post is found to contain any of the content outlined above, a moderator may choose to take one of the following actions:
  • Remove the Post or Thread - the content is removed from the forum.
  • Place the User in Moderation - all posts and new threads must be approved by a moderator before they are posted.
  • Temporarily Ban the User - user is banned from forum for a period of time.
  • Permanently Ban the User - user is permanently banned from the forum.


Moderators may also rename posts and threads if they are too generic or do not property reflect the content.

Moderators may move threads if they have been posted in the incorrect forum.

Threads/Posts questioning specific moderator decisions or actions (such as "why was a user banned?") are not allowed and will be removed.

The owners of Alpha Software Corporation (Forum Owner) reserve the right to remove, edit, move, or close any thread for any reason; or ban any forum member without notice, reason, or explanation.

Community members are encouraged to click the "Report Post" icon in the lower left of a given post if they feel the post is in violation of the rules. This will alert the Moderators to take a look.

Alpha Software Corporation may amend the guidelines from time to time and may also vary the procedures it sets out where appropriate in a particular case. Your agreement to comply with the guidelines will be deemed agreement to any changes to it.



Bonus TIPS for Successful Posting

Try a Search First
It is highly recommended that a Search be done on your topic before posting, as many questions have been answered in prior posts. As with any search engine, the shorter the search term, the more "hits" will be returned, but the more specific the search term is, the greater the relevance of those "hits". Searching for "table" might well return every message on the board while "tablesum" would greatly restrict the number of messages returned.

When you do post
First, make sure you are posting your question in the correct forum. For example, if you post an issue regarding Desktop applications on the Mobile & Browser Applications board , not only will your question not be seen by the appropriate audience, it may also be removed or relocated.

The more detail you provide about your problem or question, the more likely someone is to understand your request and be able to help. A sample database with a minimum of records (and its support files, zipped together) will make it much easier to diagnose issues with your application. Screen shots of error messages are especially helpful.

When explaining how to reproduce your problem, please be as detailed as possible. Describe every step, click-by-click and keypress-by-keypress. Otherwise when others try to duplicate your problem, they may do something slightly different and end up with different results.

A note about attachments
You may only attach one file to each message. Attachment file size is limited to 2MB. If you need to include several files, you may do so by zipping them into a single archive.

If you forgot to attach your files to your post, please do NOT create a new thread. Instead, reply to your original message and attach the file there.

When attaching screen shots, it is best to attach an image file (.BMP, .JPG, .GIF, .PNG, etc.) or a zip file of several images, as opposed to a Word document containing the screen shots. Because Word documents are prone to viruses, many message board users will not open your Word file, therefore limiting their ability to help you.

Similarly, if you are uploading a zipped archive, you should simply create a .ZIP file and not a self-extracting .EXE as many users will not run your EXE file.
See more
See less

Setting Default Form to Open

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    Setting Default Form to Open

    How do i tell Alpha which of several forms to open as my default form? I have not found a discussion on this simple question in the Alpha help, the Alpha forum or a Google search.
    Garth Groft
    Director & Software Architect
    MicroComputer Task Group

    #2
    Re: Setting Default Form to Open

    The default form is the internally generated form that Alpha makes containing all fields for a table. Any saved forms cannot be the default form.
    There can be only one.

    Comment


      #3
      Re: Setting Default Form to Open

      Open from where?
      When you first start alpha?
      When you are switching from a browse?
      When you click on a table?

      Comment


        #4
        Re: Setting Default Form to Open

        Stan, I saved my default form (Warranty_Reg) as a new form (Warranty_Reg2) and added additional fields to the form. I want Alpha to open this workspace to my new form. Sounds like I must save the original form as Warranty_Reg_0 and then save Warranty_Reg2 as Warranty_Reg. Is this the way it need top be done. I was instructed to create a new form and leave the original form unchanged.

        I am also developing an Alpha Anywahere web app where my workspace has all the verions of my form and i can open any one of them. There is no default. The Web app of course is built using only one form, the most recent.

        I am a Visual FoxPro developer trying to get a handle on how Alpha is intended to be used. I prefer to develop and make changes to apps in my own envornment before implementing on my client's development server and then the live server. It is not clear how best to go about with an Alpha app. I would like to simply copy a form developed on my system to the client's enviorment. I thought I would add Warranty_Reg2 to my client's app along with Warranty_Reg and they could use either form until the new form is approved. Sounds like this many not be workable.

        This is not a critisim of Alpha. I am just trying to learn how to use it correcly.
        Garth Groft
        Director & Software Architect
        MicroComputer Task Group

        Comment


          #5
          Re: Setting Default Form to Open

          I want Alpha to open this workspace to my new form.
          In Alpha terms that is not the default form, it is the startup form. With the control panel visible use the File Menu and the Workspace Properties choice. There you will find the ability to set the form to open when the workspace is opened.
          There can be only one.

          Comment


            #6
            Re: Setting Default Form to Open

            Clicking on Alpha desktop icon opens Alpha with the standard select a workspace dialog (see screen shot). I choose "Warranty" which always opens to the same form, Warranty_Reg. I made a new form Warranty_Reg2 which reflects my change to Warranty_Reg. I want to open Warranty_Reg2 from now on as my default form.
            Attached Files
            Garth Groft
            Director & Software Architect
            MicroComputer Task Group

            Comment


              #7
              Re: Setting Default Form to Open

              With the control panel visible use the File Menu and the Workspace Properties choice. There you will find the ability to set the form to open when the workspace is opened.
              There can be only one.

              Comment


                #8
                Re: Setting Default Form to Open

                that's awesome! i poked around the menus a lot but did not find this dialog.

                my new form is now the startup form. however, the Alpha "header" reads: "Warranty_Reg_Form" and the footer reads: "Warranty_Reg_Form". see screen shots. maybe these are two different things but perhaps they can actually be synchronized.
                Attached Files
                Garth Groft
                Director & Software Architect
                MicroComputer Task Group

                Comment


                  #9
                  Re: Setting Default Form to Open

                  The footer part(if you use that) will always show the actual name.
                  I generally save/duplicate a form to a new name and then change the original keeping it as the form to use.
                  If you right-click on a form, you will see close to the bottom of the popup a way to change back to an older version of the form. Just for the ones of us that do make mistakes.

                  Starting a form can also be done in the autoexec script.
                  Dave Mason
                  [email protected]
                  Skype is dave.mason46

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Re: Setting Default Form to Open

                    The name in the windowbar is the actual form name, possibly with underscores for spaces, I don't remember. The window caption/title in the header can be set to match in the form properties, window tab, caption box.

                    Might be worth mentioning that you don't have to have the window bar visible.
                    There can be only one.

                    Comment


                      #11
                      Re: Setting Default Form to Open

                      that does it... thanks stan.
                      Garth Groft
                      Director & Software Architect
                      MicroComputer Task Group

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Re: Setting Default Form to Open

                        very good tips. thanks.

                        we can take this a bit further. since the user also needs to maintain a cusotmers table, i think a new startup form would makes sense with a button for customers and a buttom for warranry reg.

                        they now using a browse for table maintenace. but the customers table now has a new field called custcode which must uniquely identify their customers. in the past they have entered dups in the browse. i am proposing creating a form for customers table maintenance with custcode field validation. the table will be indexed on custcode, set to unique.
                        Garth Groft
                        Director & Software Architect
                        MicroComputer Task Group

                        Comment


                          #13
                          Re: Setting Default Form to Open

                          Alpha applications often include a "junk" table which never contains any records and is solely used as the basis for forms such as a startup form containing buttons which open other forms.

                          Your description of the custcode situation almost sounds as if you are accustomed to having index and setting it to unique prevents duplicate entries. Not so in Alpha. You want a custom validation in the field rules employing the key_unique() function.


                          http://wiki.alphasoftware.com/Overview+of+Field+Rules

                          http://wiki.alphasoftware.com/KEY_UNIQUE+Function
                          There can be only one.

                          Comment


                            #14
                            Re: Setting Default Form to Open

                            thanks stan.

                            this is all very important to learn about. i did not realize you had to have a table to have a form. i like apps that open to a menus like those found on many mobile device apps.

                            yes, i thought the index's unique property would prevent duplicate entries. i was aware of the key_unique() function existed but i read a thread somewhere about having to create an SQL query for validation for uniqueness.
                            Garth Groft
                            Director & Software Architect
                            MicroComputer Task Group

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Re: Setting Default Form to Open

                              the index's unique property
                              The index's unique setting means the index entries only include one record per expression. Useful if you have a table with multiple values in a field but only want to see one instance sometimes. Unique index on lastname would let you see the lastnames are in the table.

                              There is a generic uniqueness test built into the validations field rule tab you can set. The custom validation allows you to specify the message/warning if duplicate entries are attempted.

                              In Alpha forms and browses are essentially ways to view the records in tables and sets. You can do without the startup form and have the autoexec script display an xdialog of your own design. No tables involved in that but for construction and maintenance the junk table is much simpler. I suppose you could design things so that one moved from one xdialog to another without using forms at all. Wouldn't want to try it.
                              There can be only one.

                              Comment

                              Working...
                              X