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Encyclopedia of Database Systems pp 1509–1514Cite as

Form

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Synonyms

Forms-based interfaces

Definition

Paper-based forms are structured documents with empty slots that can be filled in by a user. In database systems, a form is an interface containing interaction elements that allow a user to input, update or query data in a database. Forms may also contain static displays of data taken from the database. Documents containing only structured query results and no interaction elements are generally referred to as reports rather than forms. Database interfaces comprising of a series of on-screen forms are referred to as forms-based interfaces.

Commonly a single form corresponds with one table in relational databases and one form instance corresponds with one record. More complex forms may contain or update data from multiple tables. Forms are also used to interact with other databases such as object-oriented or XML databases.

Forms can be designed and created using various visual programming tools such as: Forms specification languages; GUI...

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Recommended Reading

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Napier University, Edinburgh, UK

    Jessie Kennedy & Alan Cannon

Authors
  1. Jessie Kennedy
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  2. Alan Cannon
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jessie Kennedy .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Georgia Institute of Technology College of Computing, Atlanta, GA, USA

    Ling Liu

  2. University of Waterloo School of Computer Science, Waterloo, ON, Canada

    M. Tamer Özsu

Section Editor information

  1. Dept. di Ingegneria Informatica, Automatica e Gestionale, Universita di Roma, Roma, 185, Italy

    Tiziana Catarci

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Kennedy, J., Cannon, A. (2018). Form. In: Liu, L., Özsu, M.T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Database Systems. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-8265-9_166

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