Summary
Table of Contents
Design | System
The Fountayn clinical research platform allows displaying data in tabular format. While the tabular display for dynamic forms is automatically available, the application needs some configuration in the case of static forms. For both the dynamic and the static case some configuration can be done in order to improve the visual appearance of the tabular display.
Enabling Tabular Displays
Tabular displays are available for both dynamic and static forms, but each requires a different set of actions to configure. Dynamic forms have tabular displays enabled by default, needing no additional configuration. Static forms, however, require some configuration of the ‘Display’ worksheet in the DA.
Note: If a form is configured to be displayed as a tabular form but it is appearing for you in the list format, please review your user profile settings to ensure that tabular views weren’t disabled by accident. The section on Older Browser Support at the bottom of this article will also explain the reason that this can happen.
For Dynamic Forms
As stated above, there is no additional configuration required to enable tabular displays on dynamic forms. Tabular displays are enabled by default. The configuration options described below, however, can still be applied to modify the way dynamic forms use tabular displays.
For Static Forms
Static forms do not feature tabular display by default. Some amount of configuration in the DA is required before forms are available in this view. This configuration is performed in the ‘App Properties’ worksheet of your Data Architect file. Static forms can be displayed entirely in tabular format, or you may create a hybrid document containing both tabular entries and standard listed questions.
- Navigate to the ‘App Properties’ worksheet of your DA.
- Name: In this column, enter the formTypeID for the form you are configuring followed by “-tabGroups”.
- Value: In this column enter a comma-separated list of group ID ranges, or enter ‘*’ to apply the tabular display to all groups of the form.
Note: Both the formTypeID and the group ID can be found in the ‘Display’ worksheet of the DA.
Unless ‘*’ is entered for step 3, the system will only produce tabular displays for the groups that you list. Below is an example of valid values for this property on a form with formTypeID ‘myStaticForm’ and possessing ten group ID’s (1-10).
labs-tabGroups,mode=’simple’
The labs-tabGroups,mode=’simple’ property allows you to configure a new simplified tabular layout option for data entry that loads more rapidly and uses the space on the page more efficiently. Comma delimited values define the number of columns.
If you create a table with a significant number of columns (10 or more), the screen width remains static in simple mode and may cause the columns to run off the page.
Disabling Tabular Displays
Dynamic forms have tabular displays enabled by default, but in some circumstances, you may want to disable this feature entirely. This same functionality also allows you to disable/enable tabular displays by role. The steps below describe this process.
For General Configurations
- Navigate to the ‘App Properties’ worksheet of the DA.
- Name: In this field enter ‘tabular-’ followed by the form’s formTypeID.
- Value: In this field enter either ‘true’ or ‘false’ to enable or disable tabular views on the form.
For Role-Specific Configurations
- Navigate to the ‘App Properties’ worksheet of the DA.
- Name: In this field enter ‘tabular-formTypeID’ as above, but add to the end ‘-roleName‘, where roleName is the role you wish to configure.
- Value: In this field enter either ‘true’ or ‘false’ to enable or disable the form’s tabular views for that particular role.
Configure the Tabular Area
With tabular displays enabled, both dynamic and static forms may be modified with certain configurations. This is done by appending properties to the form’s configuration property described in the ‘For Static Forms’ section above. Below is the form these properties should take.
For Static Forms
For Dynamic Forms
As you can see, dynamic forms use a different configuration property, and don’t require a value to be entered in the ‘App Properties’ worksheet.
Optional Attributes
Below you will find a list and a description of the optional attributes that may be appended to tabular configuration properties to modify their appearance. All attributes follow the format depicted here:
Manually altering the layout of the tabular area can be difficult. Whenever you alter these settings make sure to check the result in multiple browsers for correctness.Change Header Width
This attribute ‘headerWidth’ takes an integer value and specifies the allowed width of the table header in pixels. By default, this is controlled automatically based on your browser window’s size. This will directly modify the width of the leftmost column containing the row headers. Below are sample uses of this attribute for both static and dynamic forms.
Transpose Table
This attribute ‘transpose’ takes a boolean value and directs the table to be transposed. This has the effect in static forms of placing questions in rows and groups in columns. In the case of dynamic forms, the questions are placed in rows and the forms are in columns. Below are sample uses of this attribute for both static and dynamic forms.
Setting Multiple Attributes
Sometimes you may want to assign multiple attributes to a tabular configuration. This can be done by entering them in the same configuration property as a comma-separated list. Below is a pair of examples that demonstrate how this should look.
Older Browser Support
When using older browser versions that are not supported by our browser policy, users can experience issues with the tabular view of forms. The tabularWaitTimeInSec property can be used to specify the amount of time (in seconds) that the system should attempt to display the form in tabular view before prompting the user to switch to list view.
Need more help?
Please visit the Fountayn Contact Information page.