Registration dialog

of

database files

Database Access

Document - ID	Specification Owner	Last Change	Status
	Ocke Janssen	01/26/04	final
Conforms to	
Applies to	Global options pages
Task ID(s)	I24594, i24595, i24596, i24597
Category	feature

Abstract

The registration of database files is necessary for the applications to allow the creation of e.g. mail merge documents or database ranges in spreadsheets where databases are used. Therefore a new dialog, where the user can administrate the already existing database names or create new ones, is needed.

i-Team Members (The specification owner is part of the i-Team)

	Name	E-mail Address
User Experience	Christian Jansen (CJ)	cj@openoffice.org
Development	Ocke Janssen (OJ)	oj@openoffice.org
Quality Assurance	Marc Neumann (MSC)	msc@openoffice.org
Documentation	Uwe Fischer (UFI)	ufi@openoffice.org

Approved for Implementation

	Approved by	Date
User Experience	Christian Jansen (CJ)	01/26/04
Development	Ocke Janssen (OJ)	01/26/04
Quality Assurance	Marc Neumann (MSC)	01/26/04
Documentation	Uwe Fischer (UFI)	01/22/04
String Review	Elizabeth Matthis	03/04/04

Document Change History

Rev. Level	Change	Initials	Date
1.0	Initial version	OJ	01/16/04
1.1	Merge changes from the I-team	OJ	01/20/04
1.2	Merge changes from the database meeting	OJ	01/21/04
1.3	"	OJ	01/22/04
1.4	Dialog changes	OJ	01/26/04

Contents

Glossary	1

1	Motivation	1

2	User Scenarios	1

3	Goals	1

4	Requirements and Dependencies	1

4.1	Requirements	1

4.2	Technical Dependencies	1

5	Competitive Analyses	2

6	Detailed Specification	2

6.1	The administration dialog for registered databases	2

6.2	The database link dialog	2

7	References	4

Glossary

Term	Description
Database file	The new database file format written by the new database application.
Database name	The name which uses the application to access the real database.
data source configuration data	The information how to access a database. In the current concept, this is stored in a database file.

Motivation

To assure that mail merge documents, data sheets with database ranges, old reports and old forms still work, the database files have to be registered under a unique name. That will allow the application to handle the databases names as they are used as before. Therefore a simple dialog has to be developed which gives the user the possibility of registration.

User Scenarios

Documents working with a database need to be transferred to other installations/machines. Example: a home office user creating a video collection database (file), plus spreadsheets working with it, and wants to give this (the spreadsheet, the database file, and the actual data) to a friend.

The same data should be used in a large number of documents – without defining the data source configuration data again and again

The same document, working with a database, should, at virtually the same time, be usable on different installations and/or different machines. This should not be one-way, i.e. it must be possible to repeatedly switch the platform/installation without re-entering the configuration data every time.

Goals

The applications need a common way to access databases with the name stored in their documents, therefore an administration dialog for the registration must be implemented where the user can add, modify or delete the registered database names. The registration must store a relation of database name to the location of the database file. The registration has to be done by the user and will not happen automatically. This inculcates the user on the fact that he has to copy the database file as well than just copy e.g. the mail merge document

Requirements and Dependencies

Requirements

The applications need a simple access to the database names and the corresponding database files.

Technical Dependencies

n/a

Competitive Analyses

n/a

Detailed Specification

The administration dialog for registered databases

The registration of database files implies the development of a new administration dialog which allows to add new entries, to modify or to delete existing ones. The Illustration 1 shows a first mock/up for such a dialog. The registration of a database file doesn't happen automatically, the user has to do this on his own. This dialog can be accessed from the tools->options menu.

Illustration 1 Mock-up for the database names mapping dialog The dialog supports, besides the push buttons, only single selection. Additionally when the user clicks double on an entry, the same happens as pressing the “Edit...” button.

The “New...” button opens the dialog described in The database link dialog.

The “Edit...” button opens also the dialog shown in Illustration 2, but this time the fields are filled with the current selection of the administration dialog.

The “Delete...” button simply ask for conformation before the current selection will be deleted.

String list

Item	English	German	Comments
Title (fixed text)	Registered databases	Registrierte Datenbanken	
Tree entry	Databases	Datenbanken	
Button	~New...	Neu...	Creates a new registry entry
Button	~Edit...	Bearbeiten...	Modifies an entry
Button	~Delete	Löschen	Deletes an entry
Button	~OK	OK	
Button	~Cancel	Abbrechen	
Button	~Help	Hilfe	
Column Header Text	Registered name	Registrierter Name	Header for the database name column; “Name” is correct because it is the “name” of the database. Therefore we can't say “title” here.
Column Header Text	Database file	Datenbankdatei	Header for the column in which the path is shown, including the file name.

Table 1 Database name mapping dialog

The database link dialog

When the user selects a database file through the browse (“browse...”) button, the “Name” field will be defaulted to the name of the database file without the extension, if it was empty before. Additionally the focus is set into the “Name” field and the text is selected so that the user can overwrite the name directly.

To make the selection of a database file more comfortable, the “File” field supports auto completion and is filtered by the extension of the database files. The “Name” field will not be filled in this case.

Illustration 2 Mock-up for the New dialog The OK button will only be enabled when the “File” and “Name” field contain any value. If pressed and the user defines a name which isn't unique which produces a name conflict, an error message appears which states the user his fault. See Illustration 4. Afterwards the “Name” field gets the focus and the text inside is selected.

Illustration 3 Editing an entry

Illustration 4 Error message for a name which is already registered String list

Item	English	German	Comments
Dialog Title 1	Create Database Link	Neue Datenbankverknüpfung anlegen	Title of the dialog when creating a new link.
Dialog Title 2	Edit Database Link	Datenbankverknüpfung bearbeiten	Title of the dialog when changing an existing link.
Button	~Browse...	Durch~suchen...	Opens the file open dialog
Fixed Text	Registered ~name	Registrierter ~Name	The name of the link
Fixed Text	~Database file	~Datenbankdatei	Location of the database file
Button	OK	OK	
Button	Cancel	Abbrechen	
Button	Help	Hilfe	
FixedText	The name '$file$' is already used for another database.\nPlease choose a different name.	Der Name '$file$' wird bereits für eine andere Datenbank verwendet.\nBitte wählen Sie einen anderen Namen.	Error message when a name is already used.

Table 2 Database link dialog

References

http://dba.openoffice.org/specifications/Database_application.sxw

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2004-01-16T09:00:21

Elizabeth Matthis