Drawing lines in Access


Lines are very useful in the design of forms and reports but it can be difficult to draw lines that are perfectly straight. Lines that are nearly, but not quite horizontal or vertical look bad because they have jagged steps along them.

[Crooked line]

There are three ways to make sure that your lines are exactly horizontal (or vertical).

Creating a new line

  • Click on the line tool
  • Click on the form or report.
  • Access will create a short horizontal line.
  • Press SHIFT plus left or right cursor key to make the line longer or shorter.

Drawing a new line

  • Click on the line tool.
  • Press the SHIFT key.
  • Hold it down whilst you draw the line.
  • Access will draw a line that's exactly horizontal or vertical.

Adjusting an existing line

  • Right-click on the line.
  • Select Properties.
  • The line has Height and Width properties. These define the size of a box on screen and the line runs diagonally across this box.
  • Set the Height property to zero for a vertical line; set the Width property to zero for a horizontal line.

Hints & tips

The textbox class in Visual FoxPro 9 has a new Autocomplete property which shows the user the previous values that have been entered in that textbox.
Autocomplete in VFP 9

Your Access database will look more impressive if you add custom toolbars...
Custom toolbars

FoxPro has always had functions to read and write files at a low level...
Foxpro low level file functions

More...
More pages of hints and tips for users of Microsoft FoxPro and Access databases.

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