Table fields... oh boy.

[Troy Rollins]

On Aug 15, 2004, at 2:17 AM, Richard Gaskin wrote:
>
>> To me, data grids are a pretty critical functionality....
>
> For me too, but I think you're talking about a very specific 
> implementation of a data grid, perhaps the type one sees in 
> spreadsheets or the type supported by HTML.

Not HTML. But speadsheets, or iTunes, or many other data grid driven 
program types.

>
> The built-in multi-column field has been doing me just fine for years. 
> You can put up to 4GB of tab-delimited data into it and get instant 
> results by setting the tabStops property. It supports most of the 
> behaviors commonly associated with database display, including 
> properties for selecting either single or multiple lines, and even 
> discontiguous selection.

Yes, and I've used those features, and it can work OK, but well, it 
just isn't powerful enough, and frankly, too flakey, especially if the 
user is to be able to edit the content. Layout is clumsy...

>> where entire multi-field cards are used instead of a single 
>> multi-column line in a grid. This is not a workable solution in many 
>> cases, since it doesn't support relational sorting, etc.
>
> What is "relational sorting"?

Column sorting. Obviously cards full of fields do not support column 
sorting, so I put it into another term. Relational sorting (column 
sorting) allowing rows to be sorted by the different relationships they 
have with the columns.

>
> The built-in sort command will do well with the built-in multi-column 
> list object, with the only caeat being that no single line of text can 
> be longer than 64k (which is probably wider than would be practical 
> for most common uses anyway).

Yes, I'm sure that is far wider than is needed. But a multi-column 
field doesn't do a very good job of simulating a data grid. I don't 
doubt that you have found it OK for your applications, or somehow made 
it work. In my case, the market particular product will be very 
critical of this, and anything less than "so good they don't notice 
anything other than good" is too little.

>
>> It isn't an actual OS native grid
>
> Where did you get the impression any OS provides a data grid control?
>
> If there's a native data grid control in OS X or XP it's very new; for 
> the previous 20 years everyone rolled their own.

Well, Applescript studio has one, so on the Mac at least it my not be 
part of the OS, but it is provided by Apple for constructing UI... I 
should probably say "one which appears native, matches the rest of the 
OS, and would be considered by the end user to seem appropriate on 
their system."
--
Troy
RPSystems, Ltd.
http://www.rpsystems.net