Different types of forms

Generally, in a data entry application, you have a few different types of forms. Usually you have a basic LIST or detail-block form, where you show a list of table view of data down the page. Once you select an item from a list on a detail-block form, you generally want to be taken to a more detailed record view form, where you can see all of the fields for that record.

Detail Block forms in Superbase used to be hard to work with because in earlier versions of Superbase, you could only have 1 detail block on the page. In version 2 and 3, they removed that restriction and you can now have an unlimited number of detail blocks, howerver, in doing so they had to change the file locking mechanism to be more careful about letting you or others edit while the data was displayed in scrolling detail blocks.

One of the most substantial changes that was made from version 1.XX to version 2.XX and beyond is that Superbase will automatically LOCK the record if you click into a list (detail-block) and make the cursor appear. In version 1.XX it did not do this. Also, if you programmatically attempt to display the cursor in a detail-block, Superbase must lock the record, and all "parent" records that are linked to it. This change usually confuses and trips up many people maintaining or migrating Superbase applications. How do you work around this: In verson 3.XX applications, you set the AutoLocking property of the form to OFF in your code. This means that when a person clicks into a field, Superbase will NOT automatically lock the record (the default is ON if not specified)

In the detail view (commonly called a detail view form, or record view form) Superbase only needs to lock the record when you click into a field.

In older versions of Superbase, people frequently coded an application to show the cursor in the first field of every record, in order to provide a easy way to see which record you were pointing at. In Superbase 3.XX and above, you can use the object language to programmatically change the colors of the objects on the form to show where you are, or you can use a giant Listbox object which always has a cursor inside of it, to show your position. When you upgrade an application from version 1.XX to 2.XX or 3.XX, you should change any code that tries to put the cursor into the form at times when you were NOT doing data entry.