• Advanced List Box-Record List Control
• Auto-PopulatingList Boxand Combo BoxControls
• Buttons
• Cascading Selection Lists
• Check Box Controls
• Chrome Browser Control
• Combo Boxes
• Comparing Drop-down Lists and Popup Dialogs
• Conditional Control Properties
• Conditionally Showing Controls
• Conditionally Sizing Controls
• Control Properties
• Controlling Record Navigation with the Invoice Toolbar
• Copying Selected Text from a Memo Control
• Creating a Cascading List
• Creating a User Defined Control
• Creating and Using a Multi-Level Popup Menu
• Creating Custom Toolbars
• Creating the Navigation Toolbar
• Defining Which Controls Have Tab Stops
• Displaying a Wait Message While a Branch Expands
• Displaying the Navigation Toolbar
• Dynamically Sizing List Box Row Height
• Edit Combo Box with Bubble Help for Choices
• HtmlHost
• Image Controls
• ImageViewer Control - Displaying Images on an Xdialog
• Line Breaks
• List Box
• ListView
• More Dialog Box Controls
• Numbering the Rows in a List Box
• Other Controls
• Placing a Browser Control on a Form
• Placing an HTML Edit Control on a Form
• Setting Choices for List and Combo Boxes
• Setting the Text and Value Properties of Items in a Choice List Array
• Simple List Box-Record List Control
• Special Formatting for Text Box Controls
• Specifying the Default Button
• Standard Controls
• Supercontrols
• Tab Controls
• The Record List Control
• Toolbars
• Tree Control
• User Defined Controls
• Using a Combo Box to Dynamically Redefine a Browse
• Using a Tabbed Object to Selectively Display Controls
• Using Embedded Owner-Draw Specifications in Controls
• Using Owner-Draw Specifications in Controls
• Using Radio Buttons to Select a Record
• Using the Microsoft Calendar Control
• Where is the Mouse?
• Working with List Boxes, Combo Boxes, Radio Buttons Etc
• Xdialog ListBoxes Dynamically Computing the Display Expression
• Xdialog Listboxes Horizontal Scrolling
• Xdialog Preview Button

Comparing Drop-down Lists and Popup Dialogs

Description

You can display a table lookup as a drop-down combo box, rather than in a separate pop-up window. While there are some advantages in using the pop-up window (i.e. the ability to edit and add records to the lookup table on the fly, and the ability to search for a record by any key), using a combo box creates a more natural feel for the user. The AlphaSports Invoice Form has a product combo box lookup.

The Customer_ID lookup is a pop-up window.

Using a pop-up lookup window, you can take advantage of the following features:

• Custom Browse Layout :

  You can specify a saved browse layout to use when Alpha Anywhere displays a lookup window. You have full control over the fonts, column titles, and other aspects of the appearance of the lookup Browse.

• Sort by any browse Column :

  When the lookup browse is displayed, you can sort by any column by simply clicking on the column. The first click sorts ascending. The second click sorts descending. When you do a Find, Alpha Anywhere uses the current sort column to find by.

• Efficient Finding of Records :

  When the lookup browse is displayed, you can type any letter and Alpha Anywhere invokes the Find command. For example, if you type the letter "S", Alpha Anywhere opens the Find dialog box and inserts the letter "S" in the text box, waiting for you to complete the search criteria.

• Unique Records Only :

  When you define a lookup rule, you can specify that Alpha Anywhere should only display unique records in the lookup window. For example, if your lookup window displays a list of states from a customer table, Alpha Anywhere will display one record only for each state.

• Maximized Lookup Window :

  You can specify that if the underlying form or browse window is maximized, and then when a lookup window is displayed, the window will also be maximized.