Organizing and Editing Your Data

1. Browse Screens for Seeing the Big Picture 
2. Forms for Adding or Changing Data
3. Locating Information with Browses

Depending on your computer proficiency, to start to use the system, you could start with the information below, and just play around and start adding data and then later use further documentation when you need to do something besides add, change, locate and view the information you've added. Without data, this system will not be used: it's designed around your data and keeping it tracked and organized indefinitely.

Browse Screen Example (Companies Browse)

Browse Screens

Information is accessed first from a Browse screen for the pertinent file. Browsing a file uses at least one main List Box control which scrolls the data row by row and is sorted to help locate existing data. Sometimes, as in the example above and the other main browses, there be other list boxes which show data that is linked to the main file. 

In this above case, the company will list the employees and each employee list that person's associated phone numbers and tasks. 

The three main system screens: Tasks, People and Companies are all browses and considered the main screens where most of the user time will be spent.

Whether looking for data, adding data, changing data or deleting data, you always start from a browse screen for the particular file needing editing. The buttons below the list box allow you to insert, change or delete a record.

Browses are also used to help in selecting and matching field values when entering important fields. An example would be, when entering a customer code. 

To Add a New Record:

Press <insert> or the insert button while the focus is on the list box of the file desired. No record selection is necessary because it will be sorted after the information is entered.

After signaling a change or add from the browse screen, you are taken to the appropriate form for adding or changing a data record.

To Change a Data Record:

After highlighting the record you want, you can double-click it with the mouse, or press the Change button below the list box to edit that particular data record. 

To Delete a Data Record:

After highlighting the record you want to delete, press the delete button below the list box, if allowed.

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Forms

Example: Person Form

Forms are used to edit the actual data and are usually accessed via a Browse for any individual file after Insert or Change is pressed. Each form represents the data contained in one record or row of data in the Browse table.  

Sometimes the forms also contain listed "child" information which is linked to that record and shown in additional list boxes. The related data is edited in the same way as stated above for any browse.

Each form displays prompts which name each field of information. Next to each prompt is either a blank area for adding new information or the actual field of information displayed as it was entered before. Just enter or click in that area and start typing to add or change information. 

All information is saved when OK is pressed from a form. Pressing Cancel will discard your changes.

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Locating

Finding any type of information is quick and easy from a file browse screen. The best examples of browse screens are: The Task Control Center, the People Control Center and the Company Control Center.

Browses are tables which are sorted in order of the different "key" fields in each file. On top of most  Browses is the label for the sort order in affect.  Each browse may contain multiple sorts, with each sort indicated by the tabs on top of the list box area.

If the file view has a small enough number of records, it's easy enough to just use the mouse and the normal scrolling navigation keys to find a given record. But when there are more than a few dozen records, the fastest way to find a record is to use the locating function.

To locate records in a browse, follow this procedure:

1. If there are multiple sort tabs shown on the top of a list box, select the sort containing the key field you want to search by.
2. Important: Click anywhere in the white area of the list box to give that list the focus. This tells the system any key you type will be used for the locating of a record.
3. Optionally, Hit the <down arrow> key on the keyboard to quickly clear any characters previously entered in the locator buffer.
4. Type out the first few characters of the field of information you're seeking.  Most browses use incremental locators, so that as more characters are typed the selector bar in the list box will match the characters by selecting the matched record. If the list is sorted by dates, the full dates must be entered.

 

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