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How to Put the Call Screen or Customer Overview on Tabs

A call's Details page and a customer's Overview can be split into tabs across the top of the form, each tab a whole form of its own. This keeps a busy screen tidy: for example, a tab of its own for your company's custom fields, so the Overview shows only what you use every day. You add and arrange tabs in the form designer: select the arrow beside Details or Overview in the sections sidebar, choose Customize this layout…, and use + Add tab above the form.

How do I add a tab to the call screen or the customer Overview?​

While customizing, select + Add tab in the strip above the form, type a name for the new tab and press Enter. The first time you do this, everything already on the form becomes the first tab, Main, and the new tab is added after it, empty.

  1. Start customizing with Customize this layout… in the list beside Details or Overview in the sections sidebar.
  2. Select + Add tab in the strip above the form. Before there are any tabs, the strip shows a single Main tab with the number of fields on the form beside it; pointing at it says "The whole form. + Add tab puts it on tabs."
  3. Type the tab's name. The new tab opens straight away with its name box ready and the words "New tab" selected, so typing replaces them.
  4. Press Enter to keep the name.
  5. Add fields to the new tab: double-click them in Hidden items, or drag them there from Main (see the section on moving a field to another tab).
  6. Select Done at the top of the screen.

+ Add tab always adds a tab at the end of the strip. To put one between two tabs, right-click the tab it should follow and choose Add tab after. There is no limit on the number of tabs; when there are more than fit, the strip scrolls sideways.

While customizing, each tab's name shows how many fields and panels are on it, and pointing at it says, for example, "12 fields on this tab". The strip also says "Double-click a tab to rename it · right-click for more". Clicking a tab opens it and selects it, and the properties panel under Hidden items then shows the tab: its Caption, how many fields are on it, and Move left, Move right and Delete tab.

Tabs are part of your own layout, like everything else you arrange, and Undo takes back any tab command.

How do I rename, reorder or delete a tab?​

While customizing the call screen or the customer Overview, double-click a tab's name in the strip above the form to rename it, right-click it for Move left, Move right and Delete tab, or select it and use the same buttons in the properties panel under Hidden items.

  • Rename — double-click the tab's name, or select it and press F2 or Enter, or right-click it and choose Rename…. Type the new name and press Enter, or click somewhere else, to keep it; press Escape to leave it as it was. A name left blank keeps the old one. You can also type in the Caption box of the properties panel; if you clear that box, the tab is called "Tab" and its place in the strip, such as "Tab 2". Give it a name: a saved layout with a nameless tab says so each time it is opened.
  • Move a tab — Move left and Move right in the tab's right-click menu or in the properties panel, or hold Alt and press the Left or Right arrow key (Alt+Left, Alt+Right) on the tab's name. A move that has no room that way is greyed out.
  • Delete a tab — Delete tab in the tab's right-click menu or in the properties panel, or press Delete on the tab's name. Its fields and panels go back to Hidden items, and the message line says so, for example "Deleted “Custom fields”: its 3 fields are back in Hidden items." Labels, separators, empty space and group frames on it are removed with it. Nothing on the call or customer is deleted, only the tab, and Undo brings it back.

A tab that holds a field the call or customer cannot be saved without cannot be deleted. The message line names the field, for example "Contact name is required and stays on the form."; move that field to another tab first.

Deleting down to one tab takes the strip away: the last tab's fields become the whole form again, as it was before you added tabs, and its name is not kept.

How do I move a field to another tab?​

While customizing the call screen or the customer Overview, drag the field onto the name of the other tab in the strip above the form and let go, or right-click it and choose Move to tab and then the tab. It goes to the end of that tab, and you stay on the tab you were on, so you can send several fields across one after another.

  • Drop it on the tab's name. The field goes to the end of that tab, and the message line says, for example, "“Contact name” moved to the “Contact” tab."
  • Hold it over the tab's name. Keep the pointer still over a closed tab's name for just over half a second and the tab opens under it; carry on dragging and drop the field exactly where you want it on that tab.
  • Move to tab — right-click the field and choose Move to tab, which lists the other tabs. With several items selected they all go, and the message says how many, for example "3 items moved to the “Survey” tab." This is also the way to do it from the keyboard: press Shift and F10 together (Shift+F10), move down to Move to tab, press the Right arrow key, choose the tab and press Enter.

A group moves with everything in it. Move to tab only appears once the form has at least two tabs.

Fields you add from Hidden items go to the tab that is open: a double-click (or Enter) adds the field at the end of the open tab, and the list's hint says "Drag onto the layout, or double-click to add at the end of the open tab. Drop a layout item here to hide it." You can also drag a field from Hidden items straight onto a tab's name; if that tab is not the open one, the message line says, for example, "“Site Position” added to the “Custom fields” tab."

Holding Alt and pressing an arrow key moves a field only within its own tab.

What do the tabs look like when I am not customizing?​

The tab names sit in a strip across the top of the call's Details page or the customer's Overview. Click a tab to see its fields in the same place; the header, the sections sidebar and the Unsaved changes bar stay where they are, and the numbers shown while customizing are gone.

  • Which tab opens. Opening a call or a customer shows the first tab. Going Back to a call or customer shows the tab you were on. Picking another layout from the layouts list opens its first tab, and pressing Done keeps the tab you were customizing.
  • Empty tabs are left out. A tab with nothing to show on this call or customer, for example a tab holding only fields that do not apply yet, is not drawn. If only one tab has anything to show, there is no strip at all.
  • The strip stays put. On a long tab, the strip stays at the top of the form while you scroll down the fields, so you can change tab from anywhere.
  • With the keyboard. Press the Tab key until the open tab's name has the focus, then press the Left or Right arrow key to open the previous or next tab (the last one goes round to the first), Home for the first and End for the last. There is no shortcut such as Ctrl+Page Down, because browsers keep those keys for their own tabs.
  • Your typing is kept. What you typed on one tab stays when you switch to another, including the text in the call's Details and Resolution documents, and Save saves the changes on every tab at once.

Warning: If your layout puts the call's Scheduled visits card on a different tab from the documents, its switch still counts while you cannot see it: when you change the Comment or the Details of a call with engineers' visits, Save gives every visit the new words. Open the card's tab and turn the switch off first if you do not want that. How to Update Scheduled Visits When a Call Changes explains it.

How many custom fields can a tab hold?​

Each tab of the call screen's Details page or the customer Overview shows at most 20 of your company's custom fields, so a form with tabs can show more than 20 in all. When you are customizing and the open tab already has 20, the other custom fields in Hidden items are drawn dimmed and the form designer says "A tab shows at most 20 custom fields. Take one off this tab, or put" the field's name "on another." Open or add another tab and the same field can be added there.

A tab's custom field values are looked up when you first open the tab, so for a moment its custom fields are greyed out and Save is unavailable. Opening the tab again later does not look them up again, unless you have saved a change to a custom field since. See What Are Custom Fields and How Do I Put Them on a Screen? for the rest.

Why did another tab open when I pressed Save?​

Because something on that tab of the call or customer form needs your attention. When you press Save and a field the call or customer cannot be saved without is empty, or a custom field's value is one the screen itself can see is wrong, and that field is on a tab that is not open, ABM Service opens that tab, marks the field, and shows the message above the fields, for example "Name the contact." on a call or "A customer title is required." on a customer. Nothing is saved until it is put right.

A value the server refuses after it has been sent, such as a date before 1753, is shown only as a message above the fields and does not open the field's tab: open the tab that holds the field it names and put it right.

If one of the fields with a problem is already on the tab you are looking at, the tab does not change, and the message above the fields still lists every problem. On the call screen, an empty Comment opens the tab that holds the documents, because the Comment line sits at the top of the Documents panel.