Mike Torrettinni

Great! I think I never actually used such button. I see the potential, let me try.

There is no default action - I guess it could be 'Open file', not sure yet. The most common next action, after creating a file, is to open it. As for the other actions, I will get feedback from users what would be a must, what is requested and what I can gather from general feedback. I don't want to have too many buttons, but I like your suggestions - maybe I could have context menu on filename label: - Copy File to Clipboard - Copy full name to Clipboard - Send to Email All these options are already available just a click away - in Explorer.

So far I have this design: In my project some reports are not asking for filenames and are generated automatically, but most of the reports do ask for filename. So, this new message will provide more info for both cases. Esc key to close the form works, so it's easier to continue with workflow if needed. The checkbox 'Do not show message when creating files' provides an option for users to disable this message. I'm quite pleased with result.

I agree with you in some examples, like I don't want to see 'Do you really want to Exit?' questions when I want to exit application. On the other hand, there is one Delphi component that checks for issues, and if it doesn't find anything there is absolutely no response and message/error window stays blank. So you don't know if it did its thing or not. It's almost like saying progress bars don't need to shown. So, a strictly one or the other way is not user friendly, and it also depends on application. It's just a matter of finding right combination - but who develops perfect application, perfect user interface for every user? I appreciate the different point of view- I might design things differently and not only my way 😉

Certainly a valid point, but my users already get a message showing success. Now they will get more useful one. Actually, I think I will add user setting 'Don't show file confirmation message' or similar and that should be useful. I hope this satisfies both user types.

I agree. I've been trying to come up with a case where user would save multiple files in short time period (this is the case that the message could be annoying and obstructive), but I don't think my project is used like that.

Good idea, thanks!

This is interesting. I would think when you create file you want 'success' message to appear.

Yes, even better, thanks! This looks good:

I'm curious if it is common to have form/frame for each separate design or you combine into common forms, where design is not much different for each use case? I have a lot of forms, like dialog boxes but they could have a question label and checkbox and maybe a button or two; then next example has 2 checkboxes and 1 button; or forms for exporting data, where some forms have just simple edit box for filename while others add additional checkbox or button. Now I have so many of these very similar forms, so I was thinking of having common forms that would be used for common goals and each different design would be on PageControl Tabs. And OnCreate/OnShow it would choose appropriate design and show form. Anybody has any thoughts on this, any objections or experience that such common forms proved useful?

Yes, that's how I use it. Works good.

Thank you, very precise explanation. Will need more time to process some things

Good to know!

Nice, thank you for real world example. Make sense, I could use similar concept for may search forms, if I keep a few of them.. or even if I have frames, to have unified look and feel.

Thank you, I know sometimes it's hard to give advice on my questions - sometimes they are more a discussion than problems looking for solution. Common form with frames, and it was useful. OK. Now, as you look back, would you do it same or similar way, or you would choose different strategy for same feature?

Oh, I was hoping you would share your experience... not looking for solution, just when do you personally decide what will be code generated and what not, an example where it works good for you or maybe what you tried and then decide that code generated is not suitable. Seemed like you do use it and you might have some experience to share.

Interesting view... where do you draw the line between code generated and visual? what's the threshold where you decide that form will be code generated? At a level of experience where I am, I want to avoid it, but I would love to hear a good case for code generated forms.

I very rarely use code-generated controls, I guess I have my need for visual representation during development too strong.

Thanks, still deciding what to do, but I need to do something.

Not at all. I understand it's hard to give concrete opinion, feedback, suggestion when not all details are disclosed. So, thanks for the way you do your searches. I like the search forms, because you don't need to design search filed into main screen.

I use Google Translate for non-English websites, it does pretty good job translating: https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.orangeui.cn%2F

That's a good idea, I have something like his in another situation - information based on licensed/unlicensed/trial version (each panel has it's own information shown). This would be similar to original idea, Page control, right?

I really thought I had 10 of them... so it was more general question about the approach. And most of them fit within design of those 3 examples above.

Interestingly enough, nobody is suggesting to reduce the number of forms/frames. Odd. It's almost like when you have 1 class per unit, no matter how small the class is. I'm not there, yet 🙂 I re-checked and I have 19 Search forms... they are all modal forms that hover over data view and the behavior is the same: - search form is opened on top center of data view (Virtual treeview) and locates searched line; - Next/Prev works - search logic is very similar in all of the search forms, but on different data. I need even more search forms, so I had this idea of single search form. I guess you guys are advising against this approach.

Oh, interesting. Would you care to compare what was hard to deal with that situation compared to what you have now? What did you gain with changing the design? Can you compare number of forms/frames before and now?