Contents - Index

Forms - CheckGroup

This control is very similar to the existing CheckListBox control. In *most* cases it will be preferable to use this control, but not always.The primary difference between the two is that a CheckListBox will accomodate an unlimited number of checkboxes. If there are more than will fit in the box then scroll bars appear so you scroll to the non visible boxes.The Check group takes a different approach. It will always space all the check boxes evenly in your check group taking into account the group size and number of columns.So if you know the maximum number of check boxes will fit in your check group then that may be quick way to decide which one to use.

This control also have several other advantages over the CheckBoxList:

1. Check boxes are spaced evenly as per your number of columns, it doesn't have the layout quirk that the CheckListBox has (see the notes at the end of this link )

2. The individual check box captions support HTML as per Labels, checkboxes, and radio buttons. This means you can customize each individual check box caption with respect to font, bold, color, background and of course pictures. 

3. The check boxes have a more modern look and feel

4. The Group header can contain an optional caption

A string variable with the same name as the control is automatically created to communicate with this control. Before displaying the form, set this variable with a semi colon list of items (as per the correspoinding Values parameter) for all the check boxes you want automatically checked. Any values not in this list with be left unchecked. Interroge this variable after exit of the form to determine which boxes are checked (the variable will be set to a semi colon list of corresponding Values which have the box checked)



Supported properties

Caption - The group caption

Color - This is a number (Use "Macro=>Color picker" to select the corresponding color number (though the forms designer will automatically do this for you).

Columns - The number of columns the check boxes are to display in (see note 1 above)

Container - The control that the combobox control "belongs" to. Every control has a container, and each control defaults to having the form as its container. Only a named Groupbox can be specified for the Container property (or blank to default to the form). When using the properties Top and Left, they are always relative to the control's container. Groupbox containers can be used to group like controls together. Note: You must always define the container before any controls that use this container. 

Enabled - Yes, No. The enabled property set to "No" will automatically show the control in the "gray ghost" outline and prevent the user moving focus to it.

Font - Allows you to specify the font name to use for the label caption of all the check boxes.

Height - Vertical height in pixels

Left - Position from the Left, which is the number of pixels relative to the container

Name - The checklistbox control name

Size -  Allows you to specify the point size of the label caption for alll check boxes. Note: Not all, but many fonts only support the smallest size of 8 regardless of the value you enter. 

Style - Allows you to specify the caption style. Supported styles are bold, italic, underline, strikeout. You can allocate any combination of these values to the style. Just separate each value with a ; (semi colon)

TabOrder - The Taborder property applies to all controls than can receive input focus and regulates the order the controls will jump to when using tab on the keyboard. This means it doesn't matter what order the controls are defined in your code - the taborder property will decide your tabbing order. Taborder is a "smart" property. For example, if you set the value of a control to say 7, then any existing control that has a tab order of 7 will automatically be changed to 8, and all higher tab numbers will be incremented by one.
Also note that the tab order is relative to the container, so controls inside a group box have their own tabbing order starting at zero. The group box itself has a tabbing order within its container as well (usually the form) Don't be alarmed if you update your form and see taborder values starting at 8. The macro form has a few "hidden" controls that take up tab slots. You can actually use any number you like for the Taborder (even zero). You just need to remember that tabbing order is respected in an ascending numerical sequence

Top - Position from the top, which is the number of pixels relative to the container

Type - The control type, which must always be "CheckGroup"

Values - Specify the caption/label for each corresponding check box. Each single caption/label should be separated by a ; (semi colon)

Visible - Yes, No. If set to "No" then the button will not be visible on the form

Width - Horizontal length in pixels