Announcement

**Tom Cone Jr** · 11-19-2008, 05:20 AM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

(1) Open up alphasports database, exit alphasports, click the forms tab on the AlphaSports.adb: Control Panel, click invoice, click design, click print preview, click exit preview, click print preview… nothing happens. It won’t do a print preview again unless you save it.

(2) Open up alphasports database, exit alphasports, click the code tab on the AlphaSports.adb: Control Panel, press new, press menu, press form view menu, delete the help part of the menu, click save, name it “bug”, click okay, click close… the new menu “bug” you just saved does not appear in the code window.
It will however appear if you create a new toolbar and then save that for some reason.

(3) Previous & Next record button not working sometimes…
Open Alphasports, press products, press the detail tab, press review sales for this product, press the next record button… nothing happens. Press the previous record button… nothing happens.
Press the design button, then press the form view button, press the next record button, now they work.

(4) Goto record feature is easily broken in the find customer feature of alphasports…
Open AlphaSports, click Customers, click find customer, click a record, click goto record… it goes to the correct record. Click in the customer id box, type a number like 27, hit enter (it doesn’t go to record 27 like one would think, it just makes it display the same record which was there before), click find customer again, click a record, click goto record, error…
“Script:UI_MODELESS_DLG_BOX::Customer_Information@:Find Customer: Progre line: 37 t.fetch_goto(FindRecNoForCustomerID(vCustomerID)) Command does not work in change or enter mode.”

(1) Yes, this sequence misbehaves as you say. The printing of forms is not supported well in Alpha Five. Some forms won't print at all. I suspect that very few people try to print (or preview) a form while it's in design mode, so hopefully this issue won't affect very many folks. Use the report engine to produce printed output from your database.

(2) This is working as designed. You misunderstand the purpose of the Refresh button on the Control Panel. Click the Refresh button on the control panel to add your new menu to the list on the code page of the control panel. If you wish the CP to be automatically updated you can change the "setting" for automatic control panel refreshes. It's a user preference in the settings dialog, available from the VIEW menu of the control panel. (click the "advanced" entry in the miscellaneous preferences list)

(3) This is not a bug. You misunderstand the script that is run by the "Review Sales for this Product". It does not open the called form ("Review of Sales") and then move the record pointer to the desired product. Instead, it loads the called form and then runs a base query to filter the products that can be displayed through the form (before the form is shown to the user). This limits the display in the called form to the single desired product of interest. The navigation buttons fail to work because the form can only display the one record (because the base filter is in effect). You would see the same result if you embed a filter expression in the properties of a form layout if there is only one record that meets the form's filter criteria. Furthermore, notice what happens if you move focus into the embedded browse of the called form. Now the navigation buttons on the toolbar are active. The browse is not based on the filtered products table so you can navigate among the related child table records.

(4) This is a small scripting error in how the "Find Customer" button is programmed. It's not a bug in Alpha Five itself. The "Find Customer" button on the Customer_information form should be disabled when the form is in ENTER or CHANGE mode. However, your post suggests you are misunderstanding how Alpha Five's forms work and the purpose of the "Find Customer" button. This button runs a script that displays a dialog which can then be used to fetch a desired record. The button's script has nothing to do with the objects on the form that display field values from the Customer table. The fields on the form are bound to the underlying table. When you type a different number in the customer_id field on the form, you're CHANGING the customer_id for the displayed customer. It's a mistake to think you can navigate to a different record by filling in a different customer_id field value using this form.

-- tom

ps. Alphasports is a desktop application. You've posted your message to the wrong forum, since this forum is for web server applications. You'll get better exposure if you post to the correct forum.

**stickman** · 11-19-2008, 07:07 AM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

"You've posted your message to the wrong forum"
oh dang, I just noticed. sorry.

"(2) This is working as designed. You misunderstand the purpose of the Refresh button on the Control Panel. Click the Refresh button on the control panel to add your new menu to the list on the code page of the control panel. If you wish the CP to be automatically updated you can change the "setting" for automatic control panel refreshes. It's a user preference in the settings dialog, available from the VIEW menu of the control panel. (click the "advanced" entry in the miscellaneous preferences list)"

Thanks for telling me about the refresh button, I didn't know it was there or about that setting. When you create a toolbar and save it, they must have programmed in a thing where the control panel is refreshed and did not enter that into the code for when you save a menu. that would explain this behavior.

as for your reponse to 3 & 4, I understand what is going on now, thanks.

What I gather from your reply is that I didn't really find bugs with alpha 5, but rather some design issues in the alphasports demo. As I was going through the video tutorials I just kept running into all these issues/problems and when you're learning new software it is hard to know the difference between what is a bug or a design problem or if you're just not doing something quite right, and knowing what should happen opposed to what does happen. knowing why alphasports was behaving like it did is helpful because I can take educated guesses about the behaviour witnessed in other parts of Alpha5 to determine if it is something I can do something about/fix/change or not.

**Tom Cone Jr** · 11-19-2008, 08:08 AM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Thanks for telling me about the refresh button, I didn't know it was there or about that setting. When you create a toolbar and save it, they must have programmed in a thing where the control panel is refreshed and did not enter that into the code for when you save a menu. that would explain this behavior.

I can see how inconsistent behavior would be confusing.

Most prefer to leave the "automatic refresh" setting on "No", because "Yes" slows things down as the CP keeps checking for changes on its own.

What I gather from your reply is that I didn't really find bugs with alpha 5, but rather some design issues in the alphasports demo.

For item (3) in your list, it's working the way many would design an app for their end users. The called form is "prefiltered" on purpose, to prevent the user from being able to navigate to different product table records. If the designer wanted to permit navigation, the called form wouldn't be prefiltered. It would be opened, and then the record pointer would be moved. Either approach is fine, depending upon what your design requirements are.

For item (4) in your list, I agree. The "Find Customer" button could be improved by putting this simple code at the beginning of its OnPush script

Code:

mode = parentform.mode_get()
if mode = "CHANGE" .or. mode = "ENTER"
   msgbox("oops","You must save or cancel your pending edits first.")
   end
end if

-- tom

**Scott_Walker** · 11-19-2008, 09:53 AM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Tom,

On Item# 3:

I don't understand why the previous record and next record buttons would be on this form if they cannot be used there? Is that a design error in AlphaSports?

Regards,

Scott

**Tom Cone Jr** · 11-19-2008, 10:18 AM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Scott, you seem to be be overlooking the fact that the toolbar navigation buttons can be used to navigate through the records in the embedded browse object.

Maybe it's me but the fact that navigation buttons do not permit you to move to a different product when the form is prefiltered down to a single product record is pretty easy to figure out. After all you only get to this form if you've selected a previous option to "Review sales for this Product". I think most designers would figure their end users would not expect to be able to see sales for other products while using the called form. -- tom

**Scott_Walker** · 11-19-2008, 11:16 AM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Tom,

Maybe I'm doing something wrong, but with the Product Sales Reveiw displayed for "P001", 5 records are displayed in the embedded browse. When I push the
next record or previous record button, nothing happens. What is supposed to happen when I click on them on this form?

Regards,

Scott

**Tom Cone Jr** · 11-19-2008, 11:40 AM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Scott, yes, you are doing something wrong.

In order to navigate among the records displayed in the embedded browse the browse must have focus. Click any row in the browse. Then your toolbar navigation buttons will work just fine. This is how forms that are based on sets of tables work in Alpha Five. The toolbar navigation buttons are context sensitive. If focus is on a field in the parent table, and there's only one record in the "prefiltered" display, they can't navigate anywhere. Otherwise, they navigate among "parent" table records.

On the other hand, if focus is on a row in the embedded browse (displaying linked child table records) the toolbar navigation buttons will move through the linked child table records, without changing the record pointer in the parent table.

If this isn't clear, spend some time with the default form for a set containing a single one-to-many child table. Apply some filters, watch how the navigation buttons behave.

**Peter.Greulich** · 11-19-2008, 11:56 AM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Originally posted by Scott_Walker View Post

On Item# 3:

I don't understand why the previous record and next record buttons would be on this form if they cannot be used there? Is that a design error in AlphaSports?

Personally, I believe the "Product Sales Review" form should be opened as a modal dialog. This would disable the toolbar and menu above. If really needed, I would add scroll buttons to the form in order to move the browse pointer. By using a modal dialog, the user quickly realizes that they are viewing only the single record. Because dialogs disable the toolbar & menubar by default, the user can't be confused (at least not for long), and come to realize that they are limited to this one product record.

**Scott_Walker** · 11-19-2008, 11:59 AM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Tom,

I am not talking about the toolbar navigation buttons. Those work exactly as you describe.

I am talking about the next record/previous record buttons on the form (near the retail price field). They don't work, unless you do what the original poster said.

Regards,

Scott

**Peter.Greulich** · 11-19-2008, 12:02 PM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Originally posted by Scott_Walker View Post

I am talking about the next record/previous record buttons on the form (near the retail price field). They don't work, unless you do what the original poster said.

Those shouldn't be there if you are limited to viewing a single record.

**Tom Cone Jr** · 11-19-2008, 12:05 PM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Scott, what we have here is a misunderstanding. I've been talking all along about the toolbar navigation buttons. I agree that it makes little sense to put navigation buttons in the form layout itself if the only time the form is opened in the app is when it's been prefiltered to a single record. Perhaps the person who designed the form wanted to use it elsewhere in the app, unfiltered? Sorry for the confusion. -- tom

**Tom Cone Jr** · 11-19-2008, 12:06 PM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Peter, I agree. The design could be improved.

**Scott_Walker** · 11-19-2008, 01:13 PM

Re: 4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Tom,

Not a problem. There are so many ways to do the same thing that some level of confusion is almost inevitable.

Peter,

Thanks for your reply.

Without you guys helping, I would not have a chance at mastering this stuff. I really appreciate all the help.

Regards,

Scott

Announcement

The Alpha Software Forum Participation Guidelines

4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

4 reproducible bugs in latest version of alpha five

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment