The largest apps created with Calcapp can take can take a long time
to load. Today, we are speeding up the process considerably by
compressing apps and PDF reports before they are downloaded.
Reports sent by your users normally contain all fields of your app or
only the fields of the current panel. This tip demonstrates how you
can select precisely what fields to include, which cuts down on the
size of the reports.
Can a formula be used to send reports to many email recipients and
can a button both open a report and send it? Matt posed this question
and received a reply from our co-founder David, who shared some of
our future plans for enabling buttons to execute formulas.
Add steppers to number fields to make it easy to change their values
using plus and minus buttons. Sliders take up more space, but make it
even easier to experiment. There are also new formula functions,
improved support for embedding apps in websites and a rewritten tour
template.
If only some users need to use a large number of fields, start off by
showing only a few and give users the ability to add or remove fields
using plus and minus buttons. We demonstrate this technique using a
sample app that calculates a grade point average (GPA).
Sliders enable users to rapidly change the value of a number field
within a defined range. On mobile devices with cumbersome on-screen
keypads, we expect sliders to become the preferred way of
experimenting with numeric inputs.
Steppers enable users to quickly increase or decrease numbers using
dedicated buttons, displayed next to the value. A variety of
properties are available for customizing steppers, including minimum
and maximum values.
The new formula functions TONUMBER, TOLOGICAL and TOTEXT make it easy
to convert values to numbers, logical values and text strings,
respectively. Converting numbers stored as text to true numbers was
previously impossible if the number had a fractional part.
The tour template shows off many of Calcapp's features and has been
completely rewritten. The new tour demonstrates steppers, sliders,
number formatting, date calculations, cross-references and more.
There's even a color selector for the background color.
Remove the navigation bar from shared apps that have only one panel
simply by ensuring that you don't type a panel title. This change
especially benefits apps embedded in other websites.