Incomplete Default Display of Database Records

[John Martin]

I have a Movies database with 826 records. When I select the Movies form with a default layout, it displays a list of only the first 360 records (from A to I, sorted alphabetically by title). The only way I have found to view all the records in a list is to save a search with all criteria empty. However, I am able to find any record using a general search for a word in the movie’s title or in another field. I cannot find any menu command or setting that would limit what records are displayed by default. I have tried compacting the database, with no change in behaviour. Any suggestions to fix this would be appreciated! I am running Tap Forms 5.3.41 on a 2023 M3 iMac with MacOS Sequoia 15.1. This behaviour may have begun when I upgraded to Sequoia.

[Brendan]

Hi John,

My thought on this is your database file may have become corrupted.

I would recommend selecting that Saved Search that shows all your records, then use the Export Tap Forms Archive command in the File menu. Save the .tfarc file somewhere, then use the New Document command to make a new document.

Then with the new document opened, select Import Tap Forms Archive from the File menu and import the .tfarc file previously created.

That should work much better now.

Thanks,

Brendan

[John Martin]

Thanks, Brendan. That worked. I now see all records by default when I select the Movies form.

As a follow-up question, do you have any recommendation for using Documents vs. Forms to contain individual databases? I have 13 separate Forms in a single Document. Is there a material risk that corruption within a single Form could affect the entire Document? Would it be “safer” (although less convenient) to have separate Documents for each individual Form (or perhaps for a small number of related Forms)?

I’ll comment that I have been using Tap Forms for many years (since Bento was discontinued in 2013) and have not encountered any significant issues or bugs with it, so I don’t think there is much risk either way. I’m primarily curious whether I should take this opportunity to reorganize my databases.

Thanks again.

[Brendan]

The purpose of Documents was so that you could group related forms within a single document and help to improve performance and safety. Each document contains within it, its own database file. All your forms, fields, records, etc. are stored within that database file. So it’s a good idea to separate them into different documents. But it’s not necessary to have a single form in each document. That would be overkill.

[John Martin]

That makes sense. Thanks, Brendan.

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