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Introduction

In order to To add content to the a screen we need access to the palette and the screen must be unlockedscreen itself to be

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    ed - the content can be interacted with, such as a button click will trigger the button's action.
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    ed - the content can be edited, such as clicking a button will open its properties.

Locking and Unlocking a screen

The screen is unlocked if you can see the context toolbar for the screen.

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  1. To interact with the screen, 
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     the screen using the Context Toolbar option.
  2. To unlock the screen for editing, right-click anywhere on the screen to open the popup menu and select 
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    .
  3. PhixFlow displays the toolbar for the screen so that you can begin to make changes.
If you want to see how a user will experience the screen, you can  Insert excerpt_lock
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Palette

  1. To view the palette, click 
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     from the context toolbar
to display
  1. and the palette displays on the right.

Adding Content

We In this chapter, we will now create the following screen:.

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Adding a Grid

We can drag a table directly onto a screen to display it.

This is how:

 

  1. From the toolbar, click
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    s.
  2. The list of available tables will appear in the
repository
  1. Repository.
  2. Drag the
companies
  1. Companies table onto the screen canvas.
Select
  1. You will be asked how you want to display the data, select Grid.
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        2. The
      attribute picker
        1. Available Attributes selector appears and
      here
        1. we can select the attributes we wish to display, this will include the attributes from the table and
      attributes
        1. those from related tables.
      1. Select all the attributes from the Current Table and drag them onto the grid.
        1. Close the Available Attributes selector.

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      1. Column widths can be set by dragging the header to the desired width.
        1. If you want a specific size, click the column header.
        2. In the properties that open
      navigate
        1. , on the 
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          , navigate to Grid Settings → Grid Default Width (pixels) and enter a specific value
      here. 
      1. Click on the Company Name column header
      Set Grid Settings →
      1. .
        1. Set Grid Settings Grid Default Width (pixels) to be, 200.
        2. In the Label section
      we
        1. of the
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           we will change the
      name
        1. value displayed in the column header to be, Name.
        2. Click 
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          .
      1. Take some time to space out the columns as required.
        1. Once you are happy with your column layout you can test it in
      app mode
        1. App Mode to see exactly how it will appear to users. 
        2. Click 
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           in the top right corner of the screen to switch the application into App Mode
      . This is how users will experience your application.You can lock an app to interact with it as a user will but design panes remain displayed
        1. .
        2. To switch back to designing your application, click
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           in the top right-hand corner.
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      Set a

      Static

      Header

      1.  Click Click on the header, Header 1 Dynamic.
      2. Its properties open.
      3. In the Default ValueIn its Properties that open on the right, change the text in the Default Value box to be Companies Data.
      4. Click 
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        .
      Tip

      In the event that you do not see the change appear on your screen, close and reopen the screen.

      Add Items from the Palette

      1. Preferred Parent Highlighting
      1. Adding Tiles
        1. Tile Types
      2. Editing Headers
      3. Editing Footers
      4. Moving Content on the Screen
        1. Shift or not to Shift

      Adding Data as a Grid

    1. The Grid
      1. Use Custom Data Range
    2. The View
      1. Periods
      2. Inheriting the period from the table.
    3. The Table
      1. Table Period.
    4. Combined filteringDoes the grid setting override the view????
    5. CRUD Buttons
      1. Adding Crud buttons after prompt.
    6.  Attributes
      1. Adding attributes
      2. Relational Attributes
      3. Reordering Attributes
      4. Hiding Attributes
      5. Conditionally Hiding Attributes.
    7. Styling a Grid
      1. Basics
        1. Bold Text
      2. Available Styling i.e. default styles.
      3. Conditional Formatting Background Colour
        1. Cell and Row.
      4. Removing the Title
      5. Labelling and double header?
      6. Link to in depth How To guide
    8. In grid editing, link to how to.
    9. Adding Data as a Card Container

      1. The Container
        1. Table
        2. View
        3. Filtering
      2. The Cards
        1. Design and App mode display.
        2. Adding filters dynamically
      3. Changing the backing attributes

      Adding a Chart

      1. Simple Setup
      2. Colour Maps
      3. Link to setting up more chart types.
      Finding Layouts and Components AnchorformBuildingFindComponentParentformBuildingFindComponentParent

      It can be very useful to find a layout, component or container. There are two ways to do this:

      Using Layers

      The Layers pane is expandable from the left of the screen canvas. Select an item:

      • on the canvas to highlight it in the Layers pane
      • in the Layouts pane to highlight it on the canvas.
      If the layer section is not visible click  Insert excerpt_layer_slider_layer_slidernopaneltrue

      Using Find in Repository

      Right-click any item on an unlocked screen and select Insert excerpt_repository_find_repository_findnopaneltrue Alternatively, to search the repository, expand the Components section and navigate to the component. The position of the components on a screen is reflected in their order and nesting in the repository list. 

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      Tip

      To check whether a component is shared with multiple applications, open its properties and check the Parent Details section, which names the application or package to which the component belongs. For example a component that is shared between several applications has a package as its parent; see Package.

      Moving Components

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      1. Options
      2. Templates
        1. Complete
        2. Blank
      3. Screen Options
        1. Floating
        2. Size
        3. Open Maximised
      4. Creating from an ERD
      5. Creating from a Workflow
        1. Available Unused Actions.

      Styles 

      explanation

      Style Hierarchy

      1. Application Styles
      2. Shared Style
      3. Local Styles
      4. Formatting Rules
      5. Overriding Styles Best Practice
      6. Clearing Styles

      Creating Screens from the Home page

      1. Options
      2. Templates
        1. Complete
        2. Blank
      3. Screen Options
        1. Floating
        2. Size
        3. Open Maximised
      4. Creating from an ERD
      5. Creating from a Workflow
        1. Available Unused Actions.

      Data Type and Formatting

    10. Date
    11. Date-Time
    12. Numbers

      1. We will now add an additional Tile.
      2. Open your palette if it is not showing.
      3. Navigate to the Tiles section
      4. Drag Blank-Column onto your screen.
        1. Notice the centre of the screen highlights, this is because the body of your screen is the preferred parent of a Tile. Which means the tile is designed to be placed here.
      5. Name the tile Additional Info.
      Tip

      There are lots of tiles available, each designed to satisfy a specific need or act as a foundation for your design. Hover your mouse over any of the tiles or components in the palette to see a full description.

      Check Point

      At this point your screen should look like this:

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      Add a Card Container 
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      We will add a card container that will display the employees for the selected company.

      1. In the palette expand the Card Containers section.
      2. Drag Contacts onto the tile Additional Info.
        1. Name, Employees.
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      3. We now have a card container that is designed to hold contact information. We will use this to display employee information.
      4. Click on the Employees card container to open its
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        1. Or click on the Employees card container in the Layers section on the left.
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      5. We need to tell the card container where to get its information from. In the 
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        , under Basic Settings, click
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        , next to the Table drop down box.
      6. Drag the Employees table from the Repository into the Table box within the Employee Card Component's Basic Settings.
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        2. This sets the Employees as the table backing the card container and will allow us to display the data.
        3. Click 
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        4. When working in Design Mode, the card container will only display one card containing the data from the first record it receives from the backing table. When we switch to 
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           or 
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          , all the data we have chosen will be displayed.

      7. To display the data on the Employees table, either:

      a. Change the names of the form fields and dynamic text fields to match the attribute name on the Employees table.

      b. Or, tell PhixFlow which attributes to associate with them using the Add Backing Attribute option.

      8. Here we will use the latter:

      a. Right-click on First Name and select Add Backing Attribute.

      b. In the Available Attributes selector that opens, tick first_name.

      c. Click the Add button.

      i. The form field will now display this data in the first_name attribute on the screen.

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      d. We will repeat these steps but this time set the Last Name field to be the last_name attribute on the Employees table.

      9. We will return to this card container later and add additional content.

      Add a Splitter

      We will now add a splitter. This will allow us to separate a tile into two separate sections.

      1. In the palette, open the Basic Layouts section.
      2. Drag the Area - Split H onto the tile Additional Info.
      3. Name it Splitter.
        1. This will most likely have moved the card container. What we will do now is move the card container into the top part of the splitter.
      4. In the Layers section on the left:
        1. Expand Splitter.
        2. Find the Employees card container. Click on it and hold the shift key, and now drag it onto Split Area Top
          1. The card container will now appear in the top area. Dragging + Shift key moves items out of or into a different container. Dragging without the shift key moves the items within a container.
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      5. We will now add a map to the Splitter Area Bottom.
        1. From the palette → Maps section, drag the Map over the bottom area of Splitter.
          1. Name it Map.
            1. This is a generic map, instructions are provided in the expression for the component on how to set this to dynamically update or see the article: How-to Create a Google Map
          2. The map will display when we switch to 
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             or 
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             the screen.

      Moving Components

      To find out more about moving components see Moving Components on a Screen.

      Check Point

      Switch to 

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       or 
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       the screen and it should look like the image below:

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      Tile Formatting

      We will now look at formatting the tiles. By default tiles have Fit to available space enabled, which means that the tiles will consume the space available to them on the screen and tile content will be made to fit the tile e.g. if the content is too big to display in the tile a scrollbar will be provided. When we remove Fit to available space, the tiles will be sized to fit their content. So to reiterate:

      • Fit to available space ticked: Consumes the available space.
      • Fit to available space unticked: Content will determine the size.

      Grow Factor Example

      Fit to available space is useful for laying out screen content, but sometimes we want one area to be larger than another. Here we can use the grow factor.

      1. In the Layers on the left of the screen, click on Tile in Tile Container.
      2. The 
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         will open on the right, which contains all style settings, including sizing.
      3. Set Grow Factor to 2 - This will make it larger than the other tile.
        1. The growth factor determines the proportionate size of this tile in comparison to the other tiles it shares its space with and the space available.
      4. Switch to 
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         to see the change.

      Specific Size Example

      We will now specify a specific size rather than a proportion and use Fit to available space to make sure the remaining tile automatically consumes the remaining space.

      1. Switch back to
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         and remove the growth factor added above.
      2. Click 
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        .
      3. On your screen, click on the Additional Info tile to open its 
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         on the right.
      4. Untick Fit to available space.
      5. Set Width to 350px.
        1. We can also specify sizes as a percentage, for example 33%.

      When we specify a size, typically this is what is seen on a screen. However, it should be noted that if there is insufficient space to show all the content on the screen components, including tiles, will shrink down to a minimum size, denoted in the CSS property min-size. It is often a good idea to specify a minimum and maximum size to ensure your design appears as you expect. For example, when viewing on a mobile device or very large monitor.