This page is for PhixFlow application designers who need to create a new application, or change the defaults for an existing application.

Overview

When you create an application in PhixFlow, you select a template. This configures default styles and formats for your application. For how to create a new application, see Creating an Application.

When you are working on your application in Design Mode, you can:

define data relationships: see Entity Relationship Diagrams
design screens that form the graphical user interface (GUI) of an application: see Designing Screens
connect parts of the screen to actions or Actionflows that create functionality: Understanding Actionflows

This page lists the application properties. To open the application properties tab:

Go to the Repository tab.
If the tab is not present, in the PhixFlow toolbar, click the Repository icon.
In the Applications section, double-click your application's name.
PhixFlow opens the properties tab for the application on the right.

Use the options to set:

icons for the application
defaults for:
- number formats
- styles for grids
- components to use for displaying data.
menus so that user's can navigate through the application
access privileges to specify which users can use the application.
any packages containing shared resources that your application can use; see Package.

Loading an Application

Application users can load an application into Application Mode to interact with data, for example to view and update it.

You can work on the files in an application's project without loading it. However, if you load an application, the repository is automatically filtered to show just the files available to the application.

There are several ways to load an application.

From the application menu, click the application card to load it.
By default, PhixFlow opens with the application menu displayed. To redisplay the menu, in the top left of the PhixFlow window click:
- either the Application menu
- or the , if it appears.
From the repository, right-click on the application name and select Load Application.
In a browser address bar, enter the application URL; see Starting PhixFlow on the Client. When PhixFlow is started in this way, you can still navigate to other applications that you have permission to access.

Application

Property Pane Toolbar

For information about the toolbar options, see the Common Properties page, Toolbars and Controls section.

Properties Tab

Basic Settings

Field		Description
Name	Enter the name of the application.
Model Validation Status	When you save changes to the properties of a table or view attribute, PhixFlow validates that the properties are set correctly. If there is an issue with the properties, PhixFlow indicates the status of the validation check: UNKNOWN - PhixFlow has not run the validation check yet. Save the properties to run the check. SUCCESS - the properties are set correctly ERROR - PhixFlow has found issues that need attention. Scroll down the properties to the Errors section where you will find the list of properties that need correcting. When a table or view attribute has validation errors, PhixFlow also reports that the parent application and package have errors. PhixFlow can process data from tables or view attributes that have validation errors. The validation checks help you to configure tables and view attributes so that PhixFlow can continue to run efficiently. For example, PhixFlow reports an error if a table has no Data Retention option set because it can affect performance when all old tablesets are retained, To run validation checks on all tables, view attributes, applications and packages, use Administration Menu → More → Validate Model Objects.
Version	Enter a version number for your application. Use this to track the stages of development or maintenance for your application.
Do not show in the Application Menu	Select whether or not this application appears in the Application menu. For example, you may have a test application that should not be visible to other PhixFlow users. Use the repository to open an application that is not present in the Welcome window's application list. Untick to include this application. Tick to exclude this application. This is useful for test applications that you do not want anyone else to see.
Default Date Format	Select the default format for Date attributes and components.	Select a format from the drop-down list or click the icons to: Date Format: shows the date or date/time formats available for this application in the repository. Create New: create a new format.
Default Date/Time Format	Select the default format for DateTime attributes and components.
Default Number Format	Select the default format for numbers.	Select a format from the drop-down list or click the icons to: List Formats: shows the number formats available for this application in the repository. Create New: create a new format.
Default Component Palette	Select the palette that you want to use when you drag a table, view or attribute onto a screen canvas. PhixFlow uses this palette when its container application is running. If the container application for is not running, PhixFlow uses: either the default palette set for the area. or the default palette for the destination application when you are dragging attributes into a layout for a different (destination) application that is running. If you do not set a default palette, PhixFlow uses the system default palette. Basic palettes are installed with PhixFlow. Additional palettes are available, see Understanding Template Packages and Installing Template Packages.
Application Icon	Select an uploaded image to use in the application menu card for this application. We recommend an image size of approximately: height: up to 100 pixels width: 100 to 150 pixels.	See Adding Images for how to upload an image to PhixFlow. PhixFlow uploads application icons and logos to the images folder in its database. You can see a list of uploaded images in the repository > Images section.
Application Logo	Select an uploaded image to provide customised branding for the application. When a user clicks this image, it will open the application menu. We recommend an image size of approximately: height: up to 40 pixels width: up to 300 pixels.

Style Settings

When you drag a table or view onto a screen canvas, and select a grid component to display the table data, PhixFlow adds a grid. In this section, set the default appearance of grid views for the application. You can set the following:

Default Header Icon Style
Default Header Dropdown Pane Style
Default Paging Style
Grid Header Style
Grid Header Button Style
Grid Header Dropdown Button Style
Grid Row Style
Grid Alternate Row Style
Grid Row Hover Style - applies when the mouse is over a row in a grid.
Grid Column Style
Grid Column Header Style
Row Selection Style

To specify a style, select it from the drop-down list or click the icons to:

List Styles to show available styles
Add New to create a new style; see Style.

The styles you select override any styles set in System Configuration. You can override these defaults for individual grids using the style settings in the View properties.

Default Components

In this section, select an appropriate component for PhixFlow to add when you drag attributes onto a form or card container. For information about data types, see Understanding Data Types.

String
Bigstring
Long
Float
Decimal
True/False
Date
DateTime

Also set the styling for a:

Form
Card
Drop Down
Dynamic Text

And select a default:

Table Action - This is the button that PhixFlow adds when you drag a table-action onto a screen canvas.
Menu Button

Menus

This section has a toolbar with standard buttons. The grid lists the menus that have actionflows or record-actions that can be applied for this application.

PhixFlow automatically creates a default menu when you create the application project. PhixFlow will display in the default menu in the menu bar:

once you have added options to the menu
and when Show Default Menu Bar is selected (see below).

If there are several menus, listed PhixFlow uses the selected (ticked) menu as the menu bar for the application.

You can specify that PhixFlow uses a different menu for desktop and mobile devices. Right-click on a line in the list to show the popup menu options:

Desktop Menu: use this menu on desktop devices. The grid shows the desktop icon next to the menu name.
Mobile Menu: use this menu on mobile devices. The grid shows the mobile icon next to the menu name.
Create New create another menu to the list; see Startup Actions properties.
Delete delete the menu from this application.

Security Tab

Access Permissions

See the Common Properties page, Access Permissions section.

Advanced

Field	Description
Backslashes must be escaped in expressions	There is a change in 9.0.0 which affects escaped backslashes in expressions. This option maintains backwards compatibility. By default this will be ticked for applications created before 9.0.0, and unticked for later applications.

Packages

This section has a toolbar with standard buttons. The grid contains a list of packages.

A package is a bundle of PhixFlow items that are shared between multiple applications. When you export/import an application to another PhixFlow instance, it is important to export/import all packages with the application; see Moving Items and Data Between Instances.

One package will include your applications theme settings. To add another package to the application:

Click Packages to list all the packages in the repository.
Drag packages into this list.

To remove a package from the list, use the toolbar button Delete.

Audit Tab

Audit Summary

See the Common Properties page, Audit Summary section.

Description

We recommend that you always enter a description to explain the purpose of this item.

Popup Menu Options

To access popup menus for an application:

Either, in the repository, right-click on an application's name to show the popup menu.
Or, in the application menu:
- click the More Options
- right-click anywhere on the card

Available in a popup accessed from	Option	Description
application card and repository application name	Load Application	Load the selected application so that it is running in Application Mode.
application card	Load application in a New Tab	Open a new browser tab with the selected application loaded.
application card	Load Application in a New Window	Open a new browser window with the selected application loaded.
repository application name	Filter by Name	In the repository. filter the list of applications to only show the selected application. The application is not loaded.
repository application name	Edit	In Design Mode, open the application properties tab to make changes.
repository application name	Delete	Delete the selected application from the repository. This cannot be undone.

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