Work with command buttons

• When you move a control in a form or report, you can maintain its horizontal or vertical alignment with other controls by holding down the SHIFT key while selecting and moving the control. You can move the control horizontally or vertically only, depending on which direction you move it first.
• If you need to make small adjustments to the placement of a control, you might find it easier to press the appropriate arrow keys. If Snap to Grid is on when you use the arrow keys to move a control, Access aligns the control to the grid.
• If you want to temporarily override the current Snap to Grid setting, hold down the CTRL key while you're placing, moving, or sizing a control. For example, if Snap to Grid is turned on, you can hold down the CTRL key and move a control anywhere on the form, report or data access page without aligning it to the grid. Releasing the CTRL key restores the current Snap to Grid setting.

1. Open a form, report, or data access page in Design view.
2. Select the control or controls that you want to resize. To select more than one control, hold down the SHIFT key and click each control, or drag a rectangle over the controls.
3. Drag the sizing handles until the control is the size you want.

Move handle

Sizing handles

If you select more than one control, all the controls change size as you drag the sizing handle of one control.

Note  In data access pages, you can't resize a drop-down list box vertically. The vertical size of the drop-down list box is based on the font setting of the data in the control.

Tip

1. Open a form or report in Design view.
2. Select the controls that you want to size by holding down the SHIFT key and clicking each control, or by dragging a rectangle over the controls.
3. On the Format menu, point to Size, and then click one of the following commands:
   • To Tallest Makes the controls as tall as the tallest selected control.
   • To Shortest Makes the controls as short as the shortest selected control.
   • To Widest Makes the controls as wide as the widest selected control.
   • To Narrowest Makes the controls as narrow as the narrowest selected control.

How you size controls relative to each other depends on whether you have Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.01 with Service Pack 2 (SP2), or 5.5 or later installed.

• Open a data access page in Design view.

  If you have Internet Explorer 5.5 or later installed

  1. Select the controls that you want to resize by holding down the SHIFT key and clicking each control.

     Make sure that the control that you want to align the other controls to is the last control you select and that its sizing handles are white.

     

     The sizing handles of the primary selection are white.

  2. On the Format menu, point to Size, and then click one of the following commands:
     • Height Makes the controls as tall as the primary selection.
     • Width Makes the controls as wide as the primary selection.
     • Both Makes the controls as tall and as wide as the primary selection.

  If you have Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.01 with Service Pack 2 (SP2) installed

  1. On the Format menu, click Alignment and Sizing to display the Alignment and Sizing toolbar.

     

     Align Left, Align Right, Align Top, and Align Bottom buttons

     Size Height, Size Width, and Size Height and Width buttons

  2. Make sure the control that is the size you want is selected.
  3. Do one of the following:
     • To resize just one control, click the button that you want on the Alignment and Sizing toolbar, and then click the control that you want to resize.
     • To resize several controls, lock the button that you want on the Alignment and Sizing toolbar by double-clicking it, and then click the controls that you want to resize.

       To release the lock, click the same or a different button on the Alignment and Sizing toolbar, or press ESC.

You can resize a label, command button, image control, or unbound object frame to fit its contents. Also, if you increase the font size for a control, you can resize the control to accommodate the larger font.

1. Open a form, report, or data access page in Design view.
2. Select the control or controls that you want to resize.
3. On the Format menu, point to Size, and then click To Fit.

1. Open a form, report, or data access page in Design view.
2. If the grid isn't already displayed, on the View menu, click Grid.
3. Select the controls that you want to resize.
4. On the Format menu, point to Size, and then click To Grid.

1. Open a form in Design view.
2. Click the command button or toggle button, and then click Properties on the toolbar to open its property sheet.
3. Click the Format tab, and in the Picture property box, type the path and file name for a .bmp, .ico, or .dib file. If you're not sure of the path or file name, click the Build button to open the Picture Builder.

   Tip

   In Microsoft Paint, you can create a file with a picture and caption for a button. Draw the picture and caption on a background of any size, and then select only the portion that will fit on the button. On the Edit menu, click Copy To and specify a file name in the Copy To dialog box.

1. Open a data access page in Design view.

2. Click the command button you want to add the picture to, and then click Properties on the toolbar.

3. Click the Format tab, and in the BackgroundImage property box, specify the location of image you want to use in the following format:

   url("http://WebServerName/FileName")

4. Do one of the following:

   • To specify that only one image appears on the button, set the BackgroundRepeat property to no-repeat.

   • To specify that copies of the image appear in a horizontal line on the button, set the BackgroundRepeat property to repeat-x.

   • To specify that copies of the image appear in a vertical line on the button, set the BackgroundRepeat property to repeat-y.

5. Set the position of the image in the BackgroundPositionX and BackgroundPostionY property boxes.