[AccessD] User interface

Working in .Net taught me to always have multiple ways of getting there,
menus, buttons and shortcuts/context menus.  That's the way I used to design
Access apps too whenever possible.  I actually had toolbar subforms that I
dropped on other forms in the header or footer to provide the standard
buttons or menus I frequently used.  That worked well, particularly when
using modal forms that didn't allow users to get to base menus, and I used
modal forms a lot to keep the users on the reservation.  For younger users,
especially, "user training" isn't something they want to put a lot of effort
into.  They figure they should just be able to click here and there and make
it do what they want.  Thank you Apple and Microsoft for promoting that
mentality!

Charlotte Foust

On Sat, Aug 27, 2011 at 9:16 AM, jwcolby <jwcolby at colbyconsulting.com>wrote:

> It has been awhile since I started a new Access project and I am just
> re-examining my user interface techniques and wondering how you guys do
> things.  A good example of this is whether to use buttons everywhere such as
> new record, save etc.  In the past I typically used "user training", and the
> new users are expected to use the record selector to go to a new record, do
> saves by clicking out of the form or moving on to a new record etc.
>
> The specific databases I am working on right now are for people not
> necessarily familiar with a database or data entry and so specific buttons
> can allow icons and control tip text to make things easier to learn.  OTOH
> they take up a lot of room.
>
> I have written a fairly sophisticated framework that allows me to do things
> like combo double click opening a form to display the data table behind the
> combo.  I have clients who like that, and their users are trained on such
> things, but it is not clear however that in an environment where the user is
> totally unsophisticated, allowing these kinds of things is appropriate.  In
> this case perhaps specific users should have this ability but not the
> general public so to speak.
>
> What are your thoughts on the user interface.  Feel free to write lists of
> things you do in your user interface.
>
>
> --
> John W. Colby
> www.ColbyConsulting.com
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