IBM Lotus Symphony


Forms bar in Presentations

The Forms toolbar contains the tools that you need to create an interactive form. You can use the toolbar to add controls to a form in a text document, spreadsheet, and presentation.

To access this command...

Choose View - Toolbar - Forms

To add a control to a document

  1. On the Forms toolbar, click the icon of the control that you want to add.

  2. In the document, drag to create the control.

    To create a square control field, hold down the Shift key while you drag.

Tip Icon To add a field from the field list of a table or query to a form, drag a cell into the form. In a text document, you can also drag a column header to add a field to a form. To include a label for the field, hold down the Ctrl+Shift key down when you drag a column head.

Modifying a Control

  1. Right-click the control and choose Control. A dialog opens where you can define the properties of the control.

  2. To specify a accelerator key for a control, add a tilde (~) in front of the character in the label for the control.

  3. You can drag and drop controls from one document to another document. You can also copy and paste controls between documents. When you insert a control from another document, Lotus® Symphony™ analyzes the data source, content type, and content properties of the control so that the control fits the logical structure in the target document. For example, a control that displays contents from an address book continues to display the same contents after you copy the control to a different document. You can view these properties on the Data tab page of the Form properties dialog.

Design Mode On/Off

Toggles the Design mode on or off. This function is used to switch quickly between Design and User mode. Activate to edit the form controls, deactivate to use the form controls.

Icon Design Mode on/off

Push Button

Icon

Creates a push button. This function can be used to execute a command for a defined event, such as a mouse click.

You can apply text and graphics to these buttons.

Label Field

Icon Creates a field for displaying text. These labels are only for displaying predefined text. Entries cannot be made in these fields.

Text Box

Icon Creates a text box. Text boxes are fields in which the user can enter text. In a form, text boxes display data or allow for new data input.

List Box

Icon Creates a list box. A list box lets users select an entry from a list.

Combo Box

Icon Creates a combo box. A combo box is a single-line list box with a drop-down list from which users choose an option. You can assign the "read-only" property to the combo box so that users cannot enter other entries than those found in the list.

Group Box

Icon Adds a frame that you can use to visually group similar controls, such as option buttons.

Option Button

Icon Creates an option button. Option buttons enable the user to choose one of several options. Option buttons with the same functionality are given the same name.

Check Box

Icon Creates a check box. Check boxes allow you to activate or deactivate a function in a form.

Spin Button

Icon Creates a spin button.

If you add a spin button to a Lotus Symphony spreadsheet, you can use the Data tab page to create a two-way link between the spin button and a cell. As a result, when you change the contents of a cell, the contents of the spin button are updated. Conversely, if you change the value of the spin button, the contents of the cell are updated.

Scrollbar

Icon Creates a scrollbar.

You can specify the following properties for a scrollbar:

UI name Semantics
Scroll value min Specifies the minimum height or the minimum width of a scrollbar.
Scroll value max Specifies the maximum height or the maximum width of a scrollbar.
Default scroll value Specifies the default value of a scrollbar, used when the form is reset.
Orientation Specifies the orientation of a scrollbar, that is, horizontal or vertical.
Small change Specifies the minimum amount by which you can scroll a scrollbar, for example, by clicking an arrow.
Large change Specifies the amount that a large step scrolls a scrollbar, for example, when you click between the scrollbar thumb and a scrollbar arrow.
Delay Specifies the delay in milliseconds between scrollbar trigger events. For example, the delay that occurs when you click an arrow button on the scrollbar and hold down the mouse button.
Symbol color Specifies the color of the arrows on the scrollbar.
Visible Size

Specifies the size of the scrollbar thumb in "value units". For example, a value of ("Scroll value max." minus "Scroll value min.") / 2 results in a scrollbar thumb that occupies half of the scrollbar.

To make the width of the scrollbar equal to the height of the scrollbar, set the Visible Size to zero.

In a Lotus Symphony Spreadsheets spreadsheet, you can use the Data tab page to create a two-way link between a scrollbar and a cell.

Image Button

Icon Creates a button displayed as an image. Aside from the graphic representation, an image button has the same properties as a "normal" button.

Image Control

Icon

Creates an image control. It can only be used to add images from a database. In the form document, double-click one of these controls to open the Insert Graphic dialog to insert the image. There is also a context menu (not in design mode) with commands for inserting and deleting the image.

Images from a database can be displayed in a form, and new images can be inserted in the database as long as the image control is not write-protected. The control must refer to a database field of the image type. Therefore, enter the data field into the properties window on the Data tab page.

File Selection

Icon Creates a button that enables file selection.

Navigation Bar

Icon

Creates a navigation bar. The navigation bar allows you to move through the records of a database or a database form.

Date Field

Icon Adds a date field.

Time Field

Icon Adds a time field.

Numeric Field

Icon Adds a numeric field.

Pattern Field

Icon Adds a masked field. A masked field consists of an input mask and a literal mask. The input mask determines which user data can be entered. The literal mask determines the state of the masked field when the form is loaded.

Formatted Field

Icon Creates a formatted field. A formatted field is a text box in which you can define how the inputs and outputs are formatted, and which limiting values apply.

A formatted field has special control properties (choose Format - Control).

Currency Field

Icon Adds a currency field.

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