Unit 11. Forms (II).

Editing data in a form

To edit the data of a table using a form, we need to open the form by positioning ourselves in the Database window with the Forms object selected and click on the button, or simply double click on the name of the form in the Database window.

The source data of the form will appear with the appearance defined in the form (Form view). We can then search for data using the navigation buttons we know , replace values, and modify it as if we were in the Datasheet view of a table, the only thing that changes is the appearance of the screen.

To practice you can perform the Step by step Creating forms.

The form design view

The form design view is that which allows us to define a form, here we need to indicate to Access how to present the source data in the form, and here we can use the controls we will see ahead.

To enter into the design view we need to position ourselves in the Database window with Forms selected, and then click on the button.

The Form design window will appear:

The area consists of three sections:

The Form Header, here we put what we wish to appear at the beginning of the form.

The Detail section, here the source records of the form appear, either various records or one per screen, depending on the type of form. Even though various records are visualized on one screen, we need to indicate the design corresponding to just one record in the Detail section.

The Footer section, here we need to put what we want to appear at the end of the form.

Using the View menu, and then the option Form header/Footer option we can close or open the header and footer.

The mark to the left of the option indicates to us whether the sections are open or closed, if we remove the sections we lose all the controls associated with them.

To open them we just need to select the option again.

Around the design area we have various rulers that permit us to measure the distances and the controls, we also have available to us a grid that helps us to place the controls within the design area.

To hide or see the ruler or the grid we have the Ruler and Grid options in the View menu, as we can see in the example above.

The form design bar

If you have entered into Form design and the bar does not appear, you can make it appear from the View menu, Toolbars, Form design option.

Next we will explain the various buttons that make up this bar.

The first allows us to pass from one view to another, if we drop down this menu we can select between Design view as we are describing at present, Form view which presents the source data to us in the way we defined in the design view, and the Datasheet view which we already know, the other views do not enter as part of our course.

The Save button allows us to save the changes we are making without exiting the form.

The File Search button allows us to search for archives.

After this we have the Print and Print preview (to see the effect before sending the form to the printer).

Later we have the Cut , Copy , Paste , and Copy Format buttons to apply these same actions to the controls of our form. In order for the Cut, Copy, and Copy format options to be available we first need to select the control/s which we want the action to apply to. E.g, select the control to copy, click on the Copy button, position yourself over the area where we want to copy to and click on the paste button.

The Undo and Redo buttons are to undo the previous actions performed if we have made a mistake or to redo them after undoing them.

To insert a hyperlink we have the button.

The next button makes the Field list box appear or disappear, here, all the data source fields appear and are easier to add into the design area as we will see ahead.

The button makes the Toolbox appear or disappear, here all the control types appear and are easier to add into the design area as we will see ahead.

With the Autoformat button we can change our form's aspect with one click to a different predefined format, these are the same styles that appear with the wizard.

All forms have an associated code page in which we can program certain actions using the VBA language (Visual Basic for Applications), this code page can be accessed by clicking on the button.

With the button we can make the Properties dialog appear or disappear of the selected control. If you want to know more about form properties clic here .

The button starts up the expression, or macros or code builder.

If we want to go to the Database window we have the button.

To create a new table, query, form, macro, etc... without exiting our form we can use the button, on dropping down we need to indicate what type of object we want to create in the database.

Finally we can access the Access help by clicking on the button.

If you want to continue with this unit go to the next page...

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