About automatic data binding

The properties of a property set defined in the interface extension designer can be automatically bound to controls on a form. This can be configured by setting the data-binding properties of the controls. All controls that support data binding have a DataSource, a DataMember, and a DataField property.

Note    When you click the Create controls on the form  toolbutton in the interface extension designer, the data-binding properties are set automatically.

For a control’s DataSource property, you can select any of the interface extension designers in the Visual Basic project. The DataMember property should be set to the internal name of the property set containing the property to which you want the control to be bound. The DataField property specifies which property in the property set the control is bound to.

At runtime, the interface extension designer will act as the data source for the controls. When the extension is initialized by the Meridian Enterprise client application, the controls will be initialized to show the property values for the selected document.

The main advantage of automatic data binding is that it does not require any coding. The default code in the Meridian Enterprise form templates is enough to make the data binding work.

The main disadvantage of automatic data binding is that this process causes considerable load on the Meridian Enterprise server. To make the data binding work automatically, the interface extension designer has to retrieve extra information from the server. If maximum performance is a consideration, for example, if many custom properties will be defined, manual data binding should be considered instead.

Related information

About the AMMPageSample sample project