>Old school. Like you're so evolutionary?
>As kool as I am - still have to pump myself up - if i offended - please forgive me!:-)

OK, but just don't let it happen again! ;) Old school isn't necessarily bad. I mean, do you drive your car with a joystick or something? Cars have been driven with steering wheels for an awfully long time!

>
>The add button just makes sense.
>It makes sense - but isn't the goal of good interface development to reduce the number of "states" a user is confronted with. There are two states in data i/o - add mode and edit mode. A blank form is usually the add mode. Industrial users pick up on it quickly - in fact with rio you can carriage return to the save button - carriage return again and it's saved - carriage return again and it's cleared to add mode!

I used to do heads down data entry forms for public opinion polls and market research. I also do point of sale. So I do know a thing or two about data entry and not just business.

The issue to me is you're clearing the form to cause an add. That's indirect. Add does the job directly. That's why you needed to put New on the tooltip. I'd be ok with the button reading new or add or anything UNTIL you cross from direct to indirect. Instead of clear, why not erase or empty? We agree it's explicitly an add or a new, not a implicit clear. The user is not supposed to be given alternate states as clear is an alternate to add/new.

>
>Look at it this way - why do users prefer modeless forms - because it reduces the number of states they have to contend with. When they click on another form in a modal solution they ask - "Why did the bell beep?"
>

I absolutely hate modal forms, but that's a side issue
>Clear is clear as mud
>Pun appreciated
>
>Redundant buttons is not bare essentials
>That is something I picked up from work I did with commercial VFP software shops. They told me what features they needed - their users told them what features they wanted - in real projects - there would be an options or preference dialog that the user could inticate what settings they prefer.
>
>in fact you're doing what you accuse others of doing.
>I am not accusing - I am suggesting that OCX controls are more appealing than grids. That modless forms are more appealing than modal - that forms that combine data from more than one table are more appealing than one form per table. I am suggesting that less is better - thats all!
>
>BTW I don't use an edit button
>I did not think you did!
>but an add - there's no clearer way to do it.
>I think the tool tip on the tool bar button says "New"!.
>
>So with a few hundred people I have to scroll through all of them?
>Hopefully the data is scoped - it would be inefficient to require staffs to "search". Some case they need searchs - but in most - they know whats going on - have a source document and just want to het to it.
>
>Some people use explorers search to look for files - I go to do and "dir" with a "/s"!
>
>If you want - add a dialog for a filter search to RIO. I like to use the SET EXACT OFF and indexed searches or a pick cycle from a nicely scoped master.
>
>Jeez I get complaints from people not wanting to have a even a hundred files in the project manager.
>RIO is 3 or four files - I don't get this one.

I mean with 100,000 people in your RIO demonstration, there'd be 100,000 items in the tree view. The project manager is a treeview and when I argue that we should have more files, people object citing more files and scrolling in the project manager as their complaint.

>
>What do you think a database app is for?
>People doing data analysis (like programmers) or "business" analysis, like accountants do need to search and isolate "issues". Data entry people usally have source documents and account codes - to them navigation controls and filters are a hindrance - the bos will ask about production if the solution forces them to look up stuff - in real projects - some sort of service could be added - but it should not be the center piece of the project.

I believe you're saying having a real-time search treeview or something should be 70-80% of our work - sounds like a very central part to me.

As to differentiating between data entry and data analysis, that depends on the app - but not really. Even if I order a pizza, I often ask them for what I ordered last time. That means there has to be a lookup for my last order - however that's implemented. If they can't do it, I blame the narrow-minded programmers or designers that didn't give ME - THE CUSTOMER, THE ACTUAL USER - the power I want.

When I go to home depot, and they need to do a price check on something the people in front of me are buying - it's a crime (or it should be) that I (and the people behind me) should have to wait. They should be able to put that order on hold - like even a phone has a hold button - and do my order.

Now that's a new idea, not old school.

>
>I don't know what you mean by everything fired from the CDX.
>SEEKs via TAGs in the CDX - the index (tag) container.

I don't do that. I will not anticipate the user's searches. There are too many combinations - and that's why I don't only use seek. There's no way I can build all the indexes for all the different possible sort orders.

>
>>>Hold the shift button down and move the the memeber to another country. There is a "readme" that shows how.
>If I have to read the manual to figure it out, that's what I call counter-intuitive.
>Theres a bug in or an issue in Treeview. When dragging and dropping in the same control - the "DropHighLite" property misbehaves. I have done projects that drag from one tree and drop on to another - and everything worked great - but this project a quick dirty compilation of rudimentary libraries and I did not have the time to figure out why drophighlite was having "issues"!
>
>The RIO Article is here - it's not the book of books - I am looking for ideas to rip-off all the time - but if we are to be compeditive with VFP - we need to move from grids based design to OCX - that all I am saying:
>http://www.utmag.com/wconnect/wc.dll?9,7,10,1463
>
>I don't equate incomplete with simple.
>Well make it complete - make it better - thats the magic of our career path!

Unfortunately, in this case I believe it's your baby, you fix it. You should have an excellent VFP demo before you demand a competition.