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DataForm

by Comune di Bologna
(14 votes)
DataForm in action

This extension generates a data input form for tables in calc, reproducing the Data - Form feature of Microsoft Office Excel.

Installation
Double-click on the extension file and follow the instructions.
After installation close both OpenOffice.org and the Quickstarter (the icon in the traybar), and start OpenOffice.org again.

Usage
In Calc, create a table with at least one row and the headline, for example:
Name | Surname | Cellphone
John | Smith | 1234455

Then, click on a range or any cell of the newly created table (not on empty cells), and go to Data - Form. That's it.
A form will appear letting you insert other records, or edit-delete the old ones.

For developers
You can also call the routine with a specified range as (optional) parameter:
coboDataForm(<B1:D10>)

Bug reports
If you want to help us with bugs, please send an error report with this data:
- error description
- operating system
- openoffice.org version

Available languages
Brazilian Portuguese, Catalan, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Hungarian, Japanese, Italian, Norwegian Bokmal, Portuguese, Russian, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish.
If anybody wants to help for the translation in other languages, please post a comment or contact us (see the link below). It's just a few strings.

License: GPL v2

Part of the extension is based on the code of this OOoForum discussion:
http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?p=283278

Download extension
Operating System: System Independent
Compatible with: OpenOffice.org 2.1 | StarOffice 8 Update 5 or higher.
Official release: 0.9.0
Date: 2009-Mar-02
Size: 28.22 KB
View all releases
License: opensource | Read license
Further product information: Product details
Provider: Comune di Bologna
Report abuse here | Contact extension owner
  • 127037 downloads initiated
  • 293 downloads this week

Comments

Sat, 07/11/2009 - 13:04 — bgman

install problem

I downloaded the extension storing the file (DataForm-0.9.0.oxt) on my ubuntu 8.04, OpenOffice 3.1.0 desktop. The installation states to "Double-click on the extension file and follow the instructions." When I double click on the file I get a box pop up that informs me "There is no application installed for this file type".

How can I proceed? Thanks!!

Sat, 07/11/2009 - 23:19 — bgman

install problem - no problem

I apologize. A little googling would have revealed the answer. Select tools - extension manager - add, then browse to the download folder and select the extension.

The input into cells that this replaces was using a drop down box. It would be cool if the extension could use them. Also, I have a macro that inserts some text into the current cell that does not work in the form. Also cool if that would work.

Many thanks to the developer. I think I'll put the extension to good work!

bgman.

Tue, 12/02/2008 - 01:11 — texhead

Bravo

Hi
I have been waiting for this extension for some time now and am very pleased with your great effort.

Thank you very much.

Texhead

Wed, 11/26/2008 - 17:27 — TedETGbiz

DataForm & OOv3

After installing and uninstalling both v0.6.1 and v0.7, I can't get anything to work. The "Form..." menu option shows up under "Data", and the extension manager says everything is there, but when I click on a selected range (built in a new spreadsheet as you describe), nothing happens. I have changed the marco security settings to "Ask", and when I look in "My Macros", DataForm isn't there. Your comment about setting this up to run on "Open Document..." implies that is should be.

Looks like your code went somewhere else ... where do I look? BTW, when I look at DataForm in Ext. Manager, the "Options" button is grayed out- I assume this is correct. I am using XP sp3 running in VMware Workstation v6.5

UPDATE:
Opps- I didn't follow the First Rule of Microsoft- when it breaks, reboot.

Works fine now...

Thanks!
Ted Thomas
Sales Manager
http://www.eTGVirtual.com/

Tue, 11/25/2008 - 16:51 — pouletfou

Error in installation

Trying to install this plug-in, I get the following error :

Configuration Parser: a
com.sun.star.xml.sax.SAXParseException occured while
parsing : - {Parser Error : [ line 33]: invalid tokenerror }.

I am on kubuntu 8.04 running openoffice 2.4.1

Tue, 11/25/2008 - 16:57 — cobo

Error

Hi,
I have received several comments about errors during install of version 0.7.0 of DataForm. I have disabled 0.7.0 and re-enabled 0.6, please try this previous release while I try to undesrtand what's wrong with 0.7.0.
Let me know if it works.

Thank you,
cobo

Tue, 11/25/2008 - 12:54 — doej033

Little improvement

Hi, could you add support for record navigation through keyboard (PgUp, PgDown, Up, Down, Home, End)? I think this will improve usability for your great extension.

Thank you.

Wed, 01/07/2009 - 12:02 — cobo

Good idea

This is a very good idea. We'll work on it, thanks.

cobo

Fri, 11/14/2008 - 18:11 — jewill23

improvement idea

Cool extension. Just wondering if you might consider an improvement where the user could select from a drop-down one of the existing column entries -- so one could either type in a new entry or just select one from a list of those already previous used in the table.

Mon, 11/17/2008 - 18:49 — cobo

Thank you

Thank you for your suggestion, but we have created this extension in order to make our users -that were accustomed to the old MS Office Excel- more comfortable with the new OpenOffice.org suite.
This kind of improvement could be certainly useful but would disorient our users, so we won't do it for now.

Anyway, this extension is open source software, so nothing keeps you from taking it, modifying it and doing your own fork.

Cheers,
cobo.

Wed, 11/12/2008 - 22:07 — emoreno

Error in translation ti spanish

Hi.

I find errors in translation to spanish. I correct the files. Can you recieve the files?

Eduardo Moreno
TOKONHU de México

Wed, 10/22/2008 - 23:44 — ChunkyC

Enhancement

Hi Cobo

At my day job we're talking about ways to make order-taking easier for our staff, so we've been discussing databases, etc., but these get complex really fast. Then I saw your extension and tried it and it's ideal! It would be really easy to create a spreadsheet with a heading for each field, pop up a form and the staff could enter all the info very easily. So here's my question....

Would it be possible to make the form pop up automatically when opening a file? If so, could it be done so that it only opens with specific files rather than all files? I'm envisioning putting a link on a staff computer pointing to a centrally stored 'order form' spreadsheet file out on our network. Staff could click the link and the form pops up ready to fill out, then they add their info and save the file. The person filling the order could then open the file from their computer and process the order.

I'll totally understand if this is too big a pain to implement.

Thu, 10/23/2008 - 08:33 — cobo

Run macro when opening a file

It's not, because i have nothing to implement! ;-)

You can run ANY macro on the opening of a specific file:
1 - Create your spreadsheet document with the heading and at least one row entry (otherwise DataForm won't work).
2 - Go to Tools - Customize. Select the Event tab. There, select the "Open document" event, and push the "Macro" button.
3 - A window pops up. Here you can select the DataForm macro: click on the "+" beside My macros, then DataForm, and DataForm again
4 - On the right box a list of functions should appear: select the "coboDataForm" function and click "OK"
5 - Click OK again
6 - IMPORTANT: select a cell of your newly created table, DO NOT close the document selecting an empty cell.
7 - Save and close your document.
8 - Now open it again and have fun. :-)

Note that this will work only if you install the DataForm extension in all the computers of your staff.

Thu, 10/23/2008 - 15:29 — ChunkyC

running macro

Well, that's just perfect! Thanks, cobo.

By the way -- I'm running it on OO version 3, and when I installed the extension, it ended up in the OpenOffice macros, not My Macros (see your step 3). Other than that, it's all working like a charm. :)

Mon, 10/27/2008 - 16:05 — cobo

Extension installation on OO 3.0

I checked the installation on OO 3.0
The behaviour you have reported is because the extension management has been changed in OO 3.0. When you install an ext, the extension manager asks you if you want to make available the extension only to the current user or to all the users: in the first case, the extension is stored under "My macros", in the second case it's stored under "OpenOffice macros".

Probably you chose to make the extension available to all the users.

Cheers,
cobo

Thu, 10/23/2008 - 15:33 — cobo

Thanks for pointing out

Thanks for pointing out this, I haven't tried installing extensions in OO 3 from scratch yet.

Cheers,
cobo.

Fri, 10/17/2008 - 14:03 — bidouille

Enhancement

Hello,
I use some keys to naviguate into form dialogbox
Tab = go to next field
Shift + Tab = go to previous field
Enter = validate the record
If I press Enter in the last field, the record is validate but I don't go to a new one.
I press Enter again and it work!

Mon, 10/27/2008 - 16:13 — cobo

Done

Hi,
Tab and Shift tab were already working as you say.
Hitting return didn't, but now I should have fixed it.. Since version 0.3.0 you can validate a record by single-hitting Return.

Cheers,
cobo

Wed, 10/22/2008 - 09:25 — cobo

Thanks

Thank you for the improvement suggestion.
I'll check it as soon as possible.

Cheers,
cobo

Fri, 10/17/2008 - 05:35 — mythcat

How i use this extension

Hi !
I upload this estension on Open Office .
How i use it ?
Thank you !
Carpe Diem !

Fri, 10/17/2008 - 07:58 — cobo

Usage

In Calc, create a table with at least one row and the headline, for example:
Name | Surname | Cellphone
John | Smith | 1234455

Then, click on any cell of the table, and go to Data - Form. That's it.
A form should appear letting you insert other records, or edit-delete the old ones.

Cheers,
cobo

Tue, 11/04/2008 - 16:40 — palinkas

Form does not appear :-(

try to use it as decribed, but unfortunally nothing happens. Wether I mark the whole range of have the cursor in a cell in first or second row....

Also using OOo 3.0 (OOO300M9 build:9358), running on WinXP

Gottfried

Sun, 11/16/2008 - 11:12 — larchen

try disable-enable the extension

Hi!

DataForm didn´t work after restarting Calc for me. But I got it to work by doing this:

1 Disable DataForm
2 Restart Calc
3 Enable DataForm
4 Restart Calc

Thanks a lot for this useful extension!

Lars

Tue, 11/04/2008 - 16:45 — cobo

Restart OpenOffice

You should try restarting OpenOffice. Remember to close the Quickstarter too.

Cheers,
cobo

Thu, 11/12/2009 - 15:26 — emanjackson

DataForm 0.9.0

Hi Cobo,

It would seem that you are the person to ask.

I have pulled my hair out (whats left of it) trying to get this extension to work, however no matter what I do, I cannot get the DataForm to open up the form at all! HELP!!!!

I think this is a great extension, if I could only get it to work...

I am Using Win 7 RC with OOo3.1.0, extension revision 0.9.0
I thought it was an incompatability with Win 7, until I also tried the same on a WinXP SP3 system..

I am at a loss as to what to do.... I have tried all of the above fixes, but to no avail, removed and reinstalled the extension, disabled, re-enabled etc etc..

Please help, I am now convinced that I have gone wrong somewhere..

Many Thanks in advance

emanjackson

:-(