Re: Message line: Another approach?

Hello Booth,

as said before, the users of what I'm trying to build are not IT noobs. The only thing I need to teach them is that *everything* on screen is important, and learning to read instead of guessing is mandatory. :-) But thanks for your comments!


Am 31.01.2020 um 20:31 schrieb Booth Martin <booth@xxxxxxxxxxxx>:

As to the locked record issue; at the very least, why add to the problem? Consider NOT locking on the read chain, rather wait until the update chain.

No. Someone else could update the record then and after UPDATE, the changes from before are gone. Yes, I could compare field values for changes and try to merge them in a meaningful way. Or rely on the user to pick which values shall get overwritten. Way too much logic when a simple lock prevents this problem from happening in the first place. I try to adhere to the KISS principle.

And yes, use a window for messages, with the options spelled out and immediately prominent & visible.

Good hint. But I want to stick with the message line, because IBM does likewise in their programs, and because less code can contain less errors. Many features of IBM delivered programs are examples for me how to actually design screens and program logic. And sometimes I could (and would) do better. Not necessarily in the first incarnation of the application, though. :-)

Additionally, on the subfile screen (usually on the upper right) I add an "Allow Edit" checkbox so that unintentional changes don't happen.

Another unnecessary screen element. I'm very appalled to screens crammed with fields, UI elements and information until it's hard to even find what you're searching for. And I'm 100% sure that when I propose a separate "read write"-checkbox, my users will complain that this is cumbersome to handle and please not implement that.

In a few instances I only display the checkbox to super users; casual users and managers are read-only.

Not applicable to my case. :-)

:wq! PoC

PGP-Key: DDD3 4ABF 6413 38DE - https://www.pocnet.net/poc-key.asc