Basic forms
These steps will create your application interface, based on Windows forms.
The Users Management form
The first form we’ll will be used to manage your Users table. Since your project already contains an initial form, let’s work with it. First of all, let’s rename it:
- Right-click your initial Form1 and choose Properties;
- Change the Name property to formUsers (this is the name of the object reference):
- Change the Text property to Users management (this will change the form title):
Now let’s add the interface to your Users table. It’s very simple:
- On Data Sources tab, select Users table:
- To create a clean interface, click the drop-down arrow and change from DataGridView to Details. This will create an TextBox control for each table field instead of a DataGridView control;
- Drag the icon representing the Users table to your form. This will create several controls in your form:
Form contents explained:
| Control name | Type | Function |
|---|---|---|
| NameTextBox | Text box | Manage Name column on Users table |
| OfficeTextBox | Text box | Manage Office column on Users table |
| PositionTextBox | Text box | Manage Position column on Users table |
| AccessControlDataSet | Data set | Maintains an in-memory copy of AccessControl database |
| TableAdapterManager | Table adapter manager | Provides the functionality to save data in related data tables |
| UsersTableAdapter | Table adapter | Provides communication between Users data set and database |
| UsersBindingSource | Binding source | Binds your form components to Users data set |
| UsersBindingNavigator | Binding navigator | The top navigation bar, to manipulate data on your form |
So far that’s all that you need to work with your database. Click Debug → Start Debugging and execute your users form to see it working.
The Systems management form
Let’s add a new form to your project:
- Click Project → Add Windows form…
- Rename it to formSystems;
- Change title to Systems management;
- Repeat the steps from Users form, but using Systems data source;
- The resulting form will look like this:
Pretty easy so far, right?