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Lesson 5Creating multipage forms
ObjectiveUsing Access's Tab Control to Create a Multipage Form.

Using Access's Tab Control to Create a Multipage Form

One of the best features added in Access 97 was the Tab control found in the Form Design toolbox. In Access 2000, the Tab control continues its role of allowing you to organize multiple pages of related information on a single form. It also allows you to move from page to page by clicking the tabs at the top of the Tab control. You can see two pages displayed in the next two figures:

one page


Both of these pages make up a form with information about projects. The last page displayed uses a Subform control, discussed in the previous lesson.

Adding a Tab control to a form


To add a Tab control to a form, you need to:
  1. Click on the Tab control in the toolbox.
  2. Drop the control onto the form you desire. You will then be presented with two pages by default.
  3. Open the property sheet by clicking on the Property Sheet toolbar button.

Once you have added the Tab control to a form, you can change the caption of each of the pages by clicking on the current caption of the page you want, then changing the Caption property located on the Format tab of the property sheet.

Adding information to a Tab control page

To add information to the individual pages, click the caption of the page in which you want to place the information, then place the controls on the Tab control as you would on the form itself.

Other Tab control issues

There are other ways to work with the Tab control, such as adding, deleting, and moving pages. To do this, right-click on the Tab control, and you will see this menu displayed:

  1. Allows you to insert a page into the Tab control after the currently selected page
  2. Deletes the currently selected page from the Tab control.
  3. Lets you organize the order of the pages in the Tab control.
  4. Affects the tab order of the currently selected page in the Tab control.

Tab Control Right Click Menu Options
The last choice presented in the MouseOver, Tab Order, gives you the ability to control the tab order on each of the pages.
To change the tab order:
  1. Highlight the page using the page’s tab.
  2. Right-click to display the shortcut menu, then choose Tab Order.

You will then see the Tab Order dialog for the page.
Tab Control Multipage Forms
In the next lesson, you will learn how to use the Chart Wizard to add a chart to a form.

Creating Multipage Forms - Exercise

Click the Exercise link below to practice creating a form and adding the Tab control.
Creating Multipage Forms - Exercise