Microsoft Access 2016 Forms: Switchboard

the switchboard is nothing more than a form you can customize with a bunch of command buttons that the front end user can click on to open up a form or report for example as opposed to using the navigation pane here if the front end user comes over and they're looking at the forms to update the customer information which one do they use here unless I clearly label them and they could get lost or maybe I have one form that I want to replace with another form if they open up the wrong form to add the customer information to update it then I could end up with data integrity issues instead I can create the switchboard that has a button that when they click on it it'll open up one of the forms here the one that I choose in other words I can control what they have access to when it comes to the forms and reports not only that but tables and queries in that I can hide this navigation pane which I'll show you how to do in a later training video and they really don't need to see the tables or queries at least in my database because both the forms and reports are based upon queries and tables so I can limit them to just the forms and reports from the switchboard and to create a switchboard we need to add the switchboard manager command to the quick access toolbar you can do that by coming up here and right clicking on it going down to customize quick access toolbar change it from popular to all commands and a sorted alphabetically so let's scroll down to the esses and there we go switchboard manager double click you know he's right up kind of up the top let's move him down to the end and click okey-dokey and then just come up here and there you go switchboard manager click on it a switchboard manager was unable to find a valid switchboard in this database would you like to create one why yes I would click yes and you can see it does three things one it brings up the switchboard manager which we'll go over in just a minute and then as you recall the switchboard manager is a forum and so there's the form right there switchboard that just got added but it doesn't have any items for command buttons on it yet and remember the form is always going to be based upon a table either directly or indirectly through a query and so there's the table switchboard items so for every item or command button that we add to the form it's got to keep track of it somehow so it's going to store that data within the switchboard items table so now back to our main switchboard we can edit it to add commands to it to open up many forms and reports but I recommend that you don't chunk up the main form with many buttons but instead we can break this down and split it off from the main switchboard to say let's have a report-- switchboard and a form switchboard because those who want reports don't want to sort through all the forms and vice-versa so I can create two additional switchboards that I can have them linked and get access to those other switchboards from the main one here so to create those additional switchboards let's come over here and click on new and we'll call this our our report switchboard click okey-dokey click on new again and this one's the maintenance switchboard to maintain our data well it's going to be the Gateway to our forms and you can call it the form switchboard but hey I'm going to call it maintenance because it's through our forms that we work with the data so that's what I'm going to be calling it click okey-dokey so I've got a total of 3 switchboards here the one is the default the main switchboard that when they open it up this form right here what we're gonna do is we're gonna have a bunch of buttons on it the links to these other switchboards and in addition to these other switchboards you can add an additional button that opens up another four more runs report so I think what I'll do is I'll add a total of four buttons one will be the customer info and that I can open up the form in add mode so I can add additional customers they don't have to go down to the maintenance switchboard to quickly add a customer and then I'll add one to open up the maintenance switchboard to open up other forms and then another to open up the report switchboard to see what reports that they can run and then finally I'll add one to close the database here so with this selected let's go ahead and click on edit and then we want to create some items on the switchboard or buttons commands click on new this one's going to be my customer info so to add customer information or to add a new customer and the command is to open a form in add mode what form is that is going to be my customer info so that way when they click on the button opens up that form and it's an ADD mode so I can just go ahead and type in the new customer click okey-dokey and then let's go ahead and click on new because you want to add another one this one's going to be the run REM reports so I want that to go to a switchboard and the switchboard is going to be the report switchboard click okie dokie click on new and then we want our maintain data form you know to maintain our data to work with the forms to update the records within the forms so the switchboard is the maintenance switchboard click okey-dokey and then finally and click on new in case if they're done with all the work and they're on the main switchboard and they want to close out we'll call this the closed and click on the drop-down arrow exit the application and that's it for that one so there's the main switchboard that we've been working on we can go ahead and you can delete them you can edit them if you need to make some changes let me click cancel you can rearrange them by saying okay close is going to be moved up or let's move it back down close out of that so once they go to the main switchboard from there it's going to spider out or they can click on a button that takes them to the maintenance to the reports or opens up the customer info form in add mode where they can quickly type in the customers information and also close out now let me go ahead and work on the switchboard reports first and what kind of commands we want on the switchboard report select it click on edit and click on new and let's add the category sales because that one when they click on the text will open up the category sales report so let's say the command is to open up the report click on the drop down arrow category sales and click okey-dokey and let's do another click on new this one will be the final report click on the drop down arrow open up report click on the drop down arrow it's the final report click OK and then after we got a couple reports here the only two that I want them to view let's give them the option to go back to the main switchboard when they're done viewing the reports if they want to close out or go to the maintenance side or they can open up forms then let's give them that button give them that choice click on new and say back to main back to main switchboard whatever you want to type in and then it's got go to switchboard and we'll select the main switchboard and click okey-dokey so that's it for my reports let's go ahead and close out and let's come back up here to the maintenance and edit that one say new and we'll have the Edit categories so we want to have the command to open up the form in edit mode so it'll display all the rector's that we can search and go through and make changes to the data therein so it's an edit mode and what form is it going to be it's gonna be the categories so then click okey-dokey and I think you get the point here that you can just keep on clicking new and for the maintenance switchboard to add additional forms so we'll stop right there since we got the pattern and let's go ahead and of course get a return back to the main switchboard click on new it's gonna be the main switchboard click okey-dokey and we close out and let's go ahead and take this for a test drive close out so our main switchboard remember it's a forum that when we turned on the switchboard manager added it here so double click and there it is cool let's go ahead and take it for a test drive the customer info click on that opens up the customer data forum in add mode so down below you only get one of one even though it has additional records because when it comes to adding additional records you're not editing any others so you can go ahead and just type in the customers information really quick and click Save and then we click Save it'll show the other records go ahead and close out and we can run the reports which opens up the report switchboard and what reports do we want to run how about the category sales oh that's nice and what's the next one final report ooh that's fancy let's close out how about if we go back to the main report the main switchboard all that is so cool this is working maintain data and we've got just one here edit the categories click on that opens up the categories form in edit mode so it shows all the records down below that I can go ahead and toggle and do some basic searches filtering update edit the data nice close out back to main and then when I'm finished the last one that we want to try is close and it closes out of my database not the applications so to open it back up it's the most recent one today here so just click on that and we're back to where we started and remember we got the switchboard items here double click on it and it keeps track in the table let me close out of the field list of the commands and what item to run and the arguments here in the table as you can see over here the switchboard is numbered so the main switchboard all-in-ones and the buttons on the switchboard and the second switchboard is the reports all identified by twos and then the maintenance all identified by 3s so the 0 and the maintenance is the switchboard and then the two commands on that switchboard now of course the switchboard doesn't look very aesthetically pleasing but you know how to go ahead and open it up in design view and make changes to it you can do it that way or you don't have to use the switchboard at all you can create your own main form that could be your switchboard that from that main form you can add a bunch of command buttons that when you click on it will open up you know your other forms and reports or another form that has a bunch of other buttons that when you click on those will open up reports and maybe another form that opens up or has a bunch of command buttons that will open up a bunch of forms this is one way that you can do it thanks for watching hey as a quick reminder if you like my video please give it a thumbs up you can also click on me and subscribe to my channel to get notified with the latest videos and four great specials on my products please see the description below this video

Channel: Kirt Kershaw

Views: 32,676

Rating: 4.9240985 out of 5

Keywords: microsoft Access 2016, Access 2016, Access, 2016, microsoft, form, forms, switchboard, switchboard form, switchboard forms, navigate, menu, form menu, menu form

Id: NF2GSvzV7qg

Length: 10min 34sec (634 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 26 2019