I am currently working on a database, in 3rd normal form, which is for
candidates who apply for a job with the law firm that I
workd for. My issue is with good form design.
I have a main form. Then I have 3 pages on a tab control ( 4 if the
type of candidate validates that is is to be shown) Each page
has a subform. The subforms can be either single or continuous, I
think I am still deciding what I want to lock down this entry form
to make entry easy.
my main menu - http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/images/newmenu.jpg
The main form is just for name and email and candidate type. If the
candidate type is one of a few types a page becomes visible
for specific info information if candidate is attorney type -
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/ima...ith4thpage.jpg ,
otherwise, there are just 3 pages. 1 is for addresses. my old address
tab and subform -
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/ima...ddtabshows.jpg An
applicant can have multiple addresses (home, work,
school etc), another is for phone numbers. my old phone tab and
subform -
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/images/phonetab.jpg An applicant can
have multiple phone numbers.
The last page is for the applications for that candidate. application
tab with application and acitivity subform -
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/ima...ctivitytab.jpg
A candidate could apply more than once, so they could have more than
one application. This will get tricky because the
application form has a subform, for the activities relevant to that
application. This is like a logical history. Activity - interview
scheduled, interview held, offer extended, rejection letter sent, etc.
Anyway, I am looking for advice on many issues. How to best control
the subforms, how to make it so that when the user is
tabbing it goes from the last field on one subform to the first field
on the next subform, and more. My hestitation is that I think I
need to make sure that there aren't more address, phone numbers,
applications or activities needed to be added at that time. My
next hesitation is that I don't want to be stopping the user with
messages every 5 seconds.
I have been playing around and consolidated the phone and address, and
taken all maintenance buttons off of the entry form. I
think this is a better direction, but I am still not sure how to make
this look and work in a solid manner.
maintenance menu for maintenance types -
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/ima...enancemenu.jpg
my new consolidated tab for address and phone -
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/images/contactinfo.jpg
Here is the issue. If you look at the address and phone subforms
(consolidated onto one tab) , you see that there are fields for 1
record, and an add button.
I am trying to figure out how to format and set up my subforms, so that
the tabbing can go straight through from the first field
(salutation) to the last field on this form, which is Followup/followup
notes, on the activity subform.
The thing is that I need to account for the possibility that a user
would need to enter in multiple addresses, phone numbers,
applications, or activities.
I do not know how to make this appear on the form in a way that will
make sense to the end user.
The old phone tab (
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/images/phonetab.jpg )
showed a way of using a continuous form so that when a first phone is
added a second record opens up. I think I kind of liked
that.
The old address tab (
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/ima...ddtabshows.jpg )
shows the form with navigation tab. I didn't like this because when a
user tabs from the zip field, the record they are on
disappears. It looks that way to the end user. The navigation buttons
show that the form has moved to a second record, but the
end user might get confused by that setup.
Here is my challenge for applications and activities.
The tab right now (
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/ima...ctivitytab.jpg )
does not account for a second
application. I put the previous and next buttons there, but stopped
because I was unsure. I could put a new record button there
too, since it is single form cycle current record.
The activities has the navigation buttons and cycles all records (
based on application id, which ties to candidate id) but again this
has the same problem as address.
Any suggestions would be wonderful. I would really love to see some
screen shots as well.
If you would like to see table relationships and detail I have those as
well:
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/ima...ationships.jpg
http://www.geocities.com/misscrf/tabledefinitions.html
