[ic] Tips and tricks -- UI

[Mike Heins]

(This is a new thing I will try and do a couple of times a week. I will
hope to accumulate these together in some sort of logical order, with the
object of eventually gtting them into the docs and online help.)

Area:     UI
Category: Administration
Item:     Tables

While navigating the Interchange UI, you may have noticed
the _Tables_ link at the bottom -- it is also available via
Administration->Tables. When you go to that page, you will find 6 icons
associated with each table.

The first one is the edit icon. When accessed, it displays a list of
database items. You can click on a key and edit the record, as you may
already know.

But did you know that you can control the display of the select page
and what fields are editable by default?

Try clicking on the highlighted link for the table name -- i.e. products
in:

	Select for table edit: _products_

When you click "products", it allows you to change the parameters for
the display of the records on the tables select and edit screens.

You can set:

fname   Label                   Description
------	------	                -------------
name	Description		Text description (in table listing and header)

height	Select page rows	Number of rows to display at selector page. Default
				is 50.

field	List on select page	The fields to show on the select page listing.
				IMPORTANT: Must have the key field (usually it
                                is the first one)

options	Fields to edit		Recommended fields to display on editor screen,
				in order of display.

help	Help			Displays at top of page. Use this to give short
				pointers about what to edit.

help_url Help URL		Links below help text on select page. Use
				this to give detailed information on how the
				user should edit the table entries.

(4.6.1 and above, not yet released)
display_filter    Backup        Selects whether the table will be exported
                                by default in multiple-table exporter

All of these features are enabled with the mv_metadata database table -- the
UI references the key corresponding to the table name when it displays
the table selector. It may use these bits of information in other places as
well. 

-- 
Akopia, Inc., 131 Willow Lane, Floor 2, Oxford, OH  45056
phone +1.513.523.7621 fax 7501 <heins@akopia.com>

If you like what you're gettin', keep doin' what you're doin'. -- Hector