Form Types

There are a few categories to describe forms that you'll need to understand when editing or building your forms.

View

Fields are shown in display format for ease of reading. Generally, the first screens users access are View forms and their counterpart to edit is available on the sidebar.

A sidebar is only available on view forms.
Fields on view forms can only be edited one at a time.
Some fields may be combined for ease in reading the information, such as "All Phone Numbers" or "Full Address".
Some fields are not editable and are "view only", e.g., Calculated Age.

Edit

All Fields are editable and should organized for ease of data entry.

Fields are not combined: Street Address, Street Address Line 2, City, State, Zip.
SAM cannot display "view" fields on edit forms, such as Timeline: Calculated Age, Length of Stay, Full Address.

Cover Page Forms

These are landing pages when accessing a client record. Cover pages are view forms and have a sidebar.

It's possible to configure different Cover pages for main entities through Cover Page Redirect settings, should you have multiple requirements per program.

Public Forms

These forms allow clients and other external users to enter information about themselves into SAM. These are commonly used for Family Inquiry and Application forms, Donation, and Volunteer Inquiry.

Form Layouts

Vertical Forms

One or two column display, one field per row, fields can be grouped into sections.

Horizontal Forms

Single column, multiple fields per row display; allows for multiple rows.

Multi-Record Form Types

Main Forms / Container Forms

The majority of forms in SAM are a Main/Container form. Main forms are based off Main entity or Case tables and can contain subforms. Container forms are generally created when building a multi-record subform to hold the form.

Sub-Forms

These forms display or allow data entry of multi-record table data. Think recording history or when you need several records. Subforms always display at the bottom of the Main/Container forms they are on.

Sub-forms can also be used to better format the content on a main form.

Examples of Forms

Cover Page / View / Vertical / Two Columns

Edit / Vertical / One Column

Container / 2 Subforms / View / Horizontal

Edit / Horizontal

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Form Types

Form Types

View

Edit