DataBrowser Class

Object
  VObject
    Control
      DataBrowser

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A data browser is a control, like a check box or edit field. However, it should ordinarily not be created as an independent control; the easiest way to use a data browser is to switch a data window to browse view. This creates the DataBrowser object; it may be referenced through the data window's Browser property. The data browser is data-aware, like a window, and may be connected to a data server as a client. It exhibits much of the same behavior as a data window: it propagates data down to the server and it responds to all the notification messages that a server sends to its clients. The easiest way to place a browser on a window as a control together with other controls is to place another data window as a nested subform; see the DataWindow class for a description. This is easily done in the Window Editor using the Edit Insert menu commands or the Auto Layout feature. See "Using the Window Editor" in your IDE User Guide for details. Data browsers present information in a spreadsheet-like table, with rows and columns. The columns are DataColumn objects. Data columns correspond to fields in a data server—each data column is linked to a server field (just like data controls on a data window). The rows correspond to records in the server. Unlike a regular data window, which displays only one record—the "current" record—at a time, the browser displays several records as rows in the table. It always maintains one row as the "current" row, which is the record the server is positioned on. References to the data and action methods that manipulate the data always refer to the "current" record, just like in a regular data window. The only difference, therefore, is visual, in that the browser shows records other than the current one. The user and the developer have a great deal of flexibility in the visual layout of data browsers. Columns can be resized and rearranged on the fly, by the user with the mouse (unless the developer disables these options) or under program control. To retain meaningful control of a column's contents after it has been rearranged, columns are identified by their name. If there is a need to use numbers for reference (as in a generic utility program that knows nothing of the meaning of its data), the columns can be referenced by their original positional number in the browser, which may or may not be the same as their visual position.