Border vs. gridline

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What’s the difference between borders and gridlines?
Why are both borders and gridlines used to demarcate the controls?
What are the relation between (top, bottom, left, right) padding and (top, bottom, left, right) margin?
What’s the gridline? Is it the gridline normally shown in the Desgin View (see the screenshot)?
Thanks for your help.
Armstrong

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Grid points and gridlines on a form or report as in your screenshot are displayed in design view only; they help you to place and align controls accurately. They are not displayed when you open the form or report to view data.

Access 2007 has a new set of properties for gridlines of a control; the padding properties are associated with these. Since I don’t have Access 2007, I don’t know anything about them.

Borders are used to demarcate the edges of controls visually; they are displayed in design view and when viewing data. You can apply a variety of 3D effects, line styles, line widths and line colors to borders.

The top, left, bottom and right margins of a control determine the space between the edges of the control and its contents. For example, if you set the left margin of a text box to 0.3 cm, the text will start 0.3 cm from the left edge of the text box, even if it is left-aligned.

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Access 2007 has a new set of properties for gridlines of a control; the padding properties are associated with these. Since I don’t have Access 2007, I don’t know anything about them.

This part is very perplexing.
HansV, thanks a lot for your help.

Armstrong

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I have seen these properties sitting the in the Properties box, but not used them nor know what they do. I found something here .

Here is an example of a form with the gridlines style changed

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I have seen these properties sitting the in the Properties box, but not used them nor know what they do. I found something here .

The fact that an Access expert didn’t know about these properties won’t surprise me. It’s not documented in Access online help. It’s neither mentioned nor discussed by 99% of Access 2007 books. It seems the borders are located inside the gridlines. What troubling me is when I adjust the top/bottom/left/right padding, I see no changes of distance between the text boxes whatsoever.
Armstrong

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It seems the borders are located inside the gridlines. What troubling me is when I adjust the top/bottom/left/right padding, I see no changes of distance between the text boxes whatsoever.

Here is another example. The Borders are solid, and are inside the Gridlines that have various patterns.
The Padding seems to control the distance between the borders and the gridlines. The margins seem to control the distance between the borders and the text.

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Here is another example. The Borders are solid, and are inside the Gridlines that have various patterns.
The Padding seems to control the distance between the borders and the gridlines. The margins seem to control the distance between the borders and the text.

Hi John,
Thanks for your painstaking effort in explaining the relation between the paddings and margins. And your illustration is the best in the world. On the other hand, the following is Access 2007’s online help:
Access Developer Reference Attachment.BottomPadding Property Gets or sets the amount of space (in inches) between the attachment and its bottom gridline. Read/write Integer.

It makes no sense to me.
Thanks for your help.
Armstrong

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Nonetheless, my interest is to find out the way to adjust the horizontal distance between the text boxes. See the screenshot. May I know how, other than using the mouse?
Armstrong

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See picture below.

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HansV,
Thanks for your annotation. However, your annotation doesn’t show the way to adjust the gap between two text boxes. For a given record source, there are scores of text boxes. Then, how could I adjust the gaps between the text boxes? Changing left/right padding won’t help.
Armstrong

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However, your annotation doesn’t show the way to adjust the gap between two text boxes.

It wasn’t intended to do that – I just wanted to clarify the meaning of the padding constants. They specify the distance between the borders and the gridlines of a control. They have nothing to do with the distance between controls.

Earlier versions of Access had tools to align and distribute controls, and to increase or decrease the distance (horizontal or vertical) between controls. I have no idea how that works in Access 2007.

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It wasn’t intended to do that – I just wanted to clarify the meaning of the padding constants. They specify the distance between the borders and the gridlines of a control. They have nothing to do with the distance between controls.

Earlier versions of Access had tools to align and distribute controls, and to increase or decrease the distance (horizontal or vertical) between controls. I have no idea how that works in Access 2007.

Hi HansV,
Thanks for your fast reply. Thanks for adding clarity. Both Access 2003 and 2007 have the same tools. Rather, the core question here is whether there is a Property like “left/right padding” and “Grid X/Y” to adjust the distance between the adjacent text boxes.
Armstrong

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Rather, the core question here is whether there is a Property like “left/right padding” and “Grid X/Y” to adjust the distance between the adjacent text boxes.

No, there isn’t.

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No, there isn’t.

HansV,
Okay. It’s no big deal. Actually, that’s what I’ve suspected. Thanks for your confirmation.
Armstrong

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Then, how could I adjust the gaps between the text boxes?

To adjust the gaps between text boxes you just drag the text boxes, or resize them.
However, in Access 2007 there is something that often gets in the way of that: Layouts.
If the textbox is part of a layout, Access does not let you put gaps between textboxes. If you reduce one, it automatically increases the one next to it to fill in the gap.
So every time in create a form or report, I select all the controls then click Remove on the Arrange tab. This does not delete the controls from the form, but removes them from the Layout so you have individual control of their size and position.

(All this has nothing to do with Gridlines and Borders)

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To adjust the gaps between text boxes you just drag the text boxes, or resize them.
However, in Access 2007 there is something that often gets in the way of that: Layouts.
If the textbox is part of a layout, Access does not let you put gaps between textboxes. If you reduce one, it automatically increases the one next to it to fill in the gap.
So every time in create a form or report, I select all the controls then click Remove on the Arrange tab. This does not delete the controls from the form, but removes them from the Layout so you have individual control of their size and position.

(All this has nothing to do with Gridlines and Borders)

Hi John,
At least, first of all, you confirm Borders and Gridlines have nothing to do with the gaps between adjacent text boxes.
Actually, I have been doing exactly what you suggest after designing form hundred times. As mentioned in your post, it’s a tedious process, first the tabular/Stocked layout must be removed. Then before adding/deleting text boxes, the tabular/stacked layout must be enabled to take advantage of the automatic features.
Thanks for your help.
Armstrong

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Then before adding/deleting text boxes, the tabular/stacked layout must be enabled to take advantage of the automatic features.

I never enable it again. I completely ignore the automatic features. (I am not even sure what they are any more, but I have found them annoying so I just pretend they don’t exist.)

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If the textbox is part of a layout, Access does not let you put gaps between textboxes. If you reduce one, it automatically increases the one next to it to fill in the gap.

That’s exactly the glitches troubling me. Thanks for confirming the weird behavior.
Armstrong

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