Outlines

About this task

Outlines, like imagemaps and navigators, provide a way for users to navigate through an application. Unlike imagemaps or navigators, outlines let you maintain a navigational structure in only one place. As your site or application changes, you make only one change in the source outline. Each navigational structure that uses that outline source is dynamically updated.

You can create an outline that lets users navigate to the views and folders in your database, perform actions, or link to other elements or URLs outside of your application. You can create an outline that navigates through your entire application or site or through part of it.

Important features of outlines include:

  • Outlines allow great flexibility of design. You can order how items appear and create different levels of hierarchy, and you can use framesets to include multiple outlines that launch links in target frames.
  • Outlines are customizable. You can control how the outline appears to users by changing text and button styles and adding icons from your database's shared resources.
  • Outline entries are fully programmable. You can add logic that controls how outline entries are rendered by the Notes® client or Web browser.

Once you create the source outline, you embed it on a page or form to create an outline control, which displays the outline to users as a site map or navigational structure. Users can click on the outline entries to take them where you want them to go.