Forms

You use forms to create, view, and edit record information. Each form is associated with a business object. In addition, one form can display or edit data from any combination of records.

The only restriction on the records that can be manipulated by one form is the form's ability to access the records. The business object from which the records were created is not important. Different forms might access the same records to provide a different presentation of the contents of those records.

The IBM TRIRIGA Application Platform provides the Form Builder tool to define and manage forms that create, view, and edit the contents of records. The Form Builder is discussed in detail in "Form building".

Each form that is created by the Form Builder is associated with a business object. Multiple forms can be associated with the same business object. This relationship allows different forms to provide different views of the data in the same kinds of records.

The fields in a form can contain values for a record that is created from the business object with which the form is associated. A form also can display values from fields in other records. A form can even display label fields that are not connected with any record at all.

Forms use workflows to control the interaction between the user and the form. A workflow is a sequence of tasks that you can specify to be run automatically. Workflows can be used with forms to customize the behavior of the form in a number of important ways as follows:

• Workflows can copy values between records and forms.
• Workflows can be used to provide immediate feedback if a person enters a wrong value in a field.
• Workflows can dynamically change the display properties of a form. The possibilities include changing the color of a label, the font of a field, or even hiding and unhiding parts of the form.
• Workflows can evaluate the overall consistency and correctness of the data in a form before they allow the data to be saved.

Workflows can be run implicitly as a result of changing the value of a field. Workflows can be run explicitly by clicking an action.

Forms that are created by the Form Builder are organized into tabs that contain sections that contain the fields. Actions that run a workflow can be associated with an entire form, an individual tab, or a section of the form. Also, buttons can be put anywhere in a form. A workflow can be run when someone clicks a button.