The Information Card Stack () is a form object that displays a built-in card stack with cards that display information about the application, such as the computation time for the last run (if a solution is not yet available) or some other solution status information. The card stack can flip between cards in a card stack to show one at a time. You associate a card stack with a data source that controls which card to show. Each card specifies a value that it compares against the data source of the card stack. The card stack shows the first card with the matching value. If no cards match, nothing shows. Enter the name of the information card stack object in the Name field.

The Settings window contains the following sections.

In this section, you specify the data source for the active card selector. The section contains a tree with a filtered view of the trees in the Application Builder and Model Builder windows. The nodes either represent some sort of data or have children that do. For a card stack, you typically only see the available parameters under Parameters, variables under Variables, and the data nodes defined under the Declarations branch. You can extend the list of available data nodes by clicking the Switch to Model Builder and Activate Data Access button () in the Active Card Selector section header, which takes you to the Model Builder, and then selecting a node in the Model Builder branch whose data you want to access. With this button active, the Settings window of the selected node displays a Select Data Source check box (a green square) next to the settings that you can include. Click to select the check box to include that data as an available source node for card stacks.

When you select a node that represents the source for the active card selector, the Use as Source toolbar button () below the tree becomes enabled. You can also right-click the node and choose Use as Source. In addition, you can click the Create New Declaration and Use It as Source button () or the Create New Form Declaration and Use It as Source button () in the Active Card Selector section header to create a new global or local (in the form) variable declaration for the information card stack and use it as the source. A Create and Use Declaration dialog box opens so that you can select the data type of the source (if applicable), its name, and its initial value (if applicable). The name cannot be in conflict with any existing variable declaration. You can extend the list of available data nodes by clicking the Switch to Model Builder and Activate Data Access button (). Click the Edit Node toolbar button () below the tree to move to the corresponding node. If necessary, the program switches to the Model Builder.

After selecting a node as the source, the node appears as the selected source under Selected source.

The table in this section contains the information cards’ associated activating values (in the Activating value column), icon (in the Icon column), and the text to display on the card (in the Text column). The stack decides which card to display through their activating values, which you type in this section. The values are then checked against the value of the source.

Click the Add Information Card button () to add a card to the table. The Information Cards dialog box then opens, where you can add some predefined cards. Click the Add>> and <<Remove buttons to add or remove information cards, respectively. Click the Custom Card button to open the Edit Information Card dialog box, where you can define the activating values, select an icon, define the text to display on the card, and select a text color (choose Inherit to use the form’s text color) for the new card. Click OK to save the card’s settings and add it to the cards in the information card stack.

Click the Delete button () or right-click the card entry in the table to remove a selected card.

Click the Edit Information Card button () to edit the individual card in the Edit Information Card dialog box that opens. In that dialog box, you can define the activating values, select an icon or add an icon and use it, define the text to display on the card, and select a text color (choose Inherit to use the form’s text color). Click OK to save the card’s settings.

The need to specify the alignment is most obvious when working in the grid mode, as it controls how the form object is aligned in its grid cell. Aligning the form object can be useful in the sketch mode too, and you can then use the alignment tools on the Arrange menu in the Form toolbar’s Sketch section. When running the application in any client other than the Windows client, the form objects may not be positioned exactly as seen in the form windows. This is because the form objects may have a different size in other clients, giving them a slightly different positioning. Specifying the alignment ensures that the form objects are aligned as you want them to be in all clients.

You can also specify the width and height of the card stack. By default, they are determined automatically. To adjust the width, select Manual from the Width list and then enter a width (in points) in the associated field. If you have chosen Fill from the Horizontal alignment list, you can instead specify a Minimum width. Choose Automatic to compute the minimum width automatically (typically, this means a minimum size of 0) or choose Manual to specify a minimum width in the text field underneath. To adjust the height, select Manual from the Height list and then enter a height (in points) in the associated field. If you have chosen Fill from the Vertical alignment list, you can instead specify a Minimum height. Choose Automatic to compute the minimum height automatically (typically, this means a minimum size of 0) or choose Manual to specify a minimum height in the text field underneath.

Additionally, in the sketch mode, you can specify the absolute position of the card stack using the Position x and Position y fields. In the grid mode, you can position the object in the grid and see the grid position as the Row, Column, Row span, and Column span values.

Under Cell margin (in grid mode only), you can control the margins around the form object. By default, the margins are taken from the parent form. From the Cell margin list, choose:

From the Background color list, select a color to use as the background in the information card stack: Transparent (the default), any of the predefined basic colors, or Custom, which makes it possible to select a custom color from a color palette.

The font and the font size for the text use the font settings from the Forms node by default. Select a font from the Font list: Default font or any of the available fonts. If needed, choose or enter a font size (in points) in the Font size combo box. The default font size is Default size.

You can also select the Bold check box to use a boldface font, the Italic check box to use italics (an italic font), and the Underline check box to use underlined text.

Under State, you can control the initial state of the information card stack when users run the application. By default, the information card stack is visible and enabled. Clear the Visible or Enabled check box if you want to make the initial state so that the information card stack is hidden or unavailable. You can then make it visible or enable it using a method. In the Form Editor, the state of the form object is indicated by a change in its appearance. Objects that are hidden become visible when selected in the Form Editor.