AX1202

Referencing the triggering component of an Axiom form update

When an update is triggered for an Axiom form, Axiom Software writes the name of the specific component that triggered the update into the Triggering Component cell at the top of the Form Control Sheet.

For example, if the update is triggered by the user clicking a Button component, then the name of that button is written to the Triggering Component field. If the update is triggered by the user selecting an item from a Combo Box component, then the name of that combo box is written to the Triggering Component field. Each update of an Axiom form is always triggered by a single specific component—either a Button component, or an interactive component that is configured to Auto-Submit.

You can use the Triggering Component field to configure "targeted updates" of data in the Axiom form. For example, you may have an Axiom query that you only want to run when a particular component changes in the Axiom form. If any other component in the form changes, the Axiom query should not be run. You can do this by using a formula to dynamically enable or disable the Axiom query based on the value of the Triggering Component field.

The following example is a simple formula that could be used in the Active setting for the Axiom query. If the update is triggered by Button1, then the query is active and will be run. If the update is triggered by any other component in the form, then the query is inactive and will not run. The same kind of formula could also be used to enable or disable certain refresh behavior settings for the Axiom query, such as to turn Refresh on Manual Refresh on or off.

=If(Control_Form!D15="Button1","On","Off")

Special triggering component behaviors

In certain cases, the Triggering Component field is not populated with a user-defined component name. Instead, it populated with is a reserved name to indicate a special triggering component behavior. These reserved names are as follows:

  • Axiom.FormSave: This name indicates that the form update was triggered by the save icon in the Task Bar. For more information, see Saving data from an Axiom form.

  • Axiom.RefreshPanel: This name indicates that a data refresh was triggered by the Filter panel. You can use this to dynamically enable or disable Axiom queries for the data refresh. A full form update does not occur in this situation, only a data refresh. For more information, see Defining refresh variables for Axiom forms.

  • $ParentForm: This name is used in the child form to indicate that the form update was triggered by the parent form, instead of by a component in the child form. This only occurs in form configurations using the Embedded Form component. For more information, see Using embedded forms.

    NOTE: There is no equivalent reserved name when the child form triggers a form update to the parent form. In that case, the triggering component for the parent form is logged as the Embedded Form component.