We went live with ARS 7.5 last April.  At that time I figured I might as
well get used to this thing called the Dev Studio and force myself to use it
unless I absolutely could not (yes there are still a few bugs that require
the Admin Tool to make a change).

It did take a few weeks to get used to and it did slow my production down a
little while I was learning the features.  Now that is over I love it!!!!
There are a number of things that can be done much faster in the Dev
Studio.  There are a handful of things that do take a little long or may
require a few more clicks but the positives far outweigh the negatives.

Hopefully this will help those who are still getting used to the Dev Studio.

   - One of the first things is to Minimize all of the windows that are
   Restored by default.  This is a great help with the workspace size issues.
   I do a lot of development on my laptop without any problem.
      - I minimize every window (tab).  Once minimized an icon is sent to
      one of margins surrounding the application and grouped by Shortcut Bars.
      Click on the appropriate icon to show that tab.  It will automatically
      minimize once you move away from it (such as opening a
form/AL/Filter/etc).
      - I find that initially opening a tab that lists objects from the
      icon, that the viewing area is a little small vertically.  You can easily
      drag the bottom down to make it larger.  I have not figured out if I
      can set the default size as a preference.
   - Press the period key to move a field
      - This was a major frustration point at first until I figured out how
      to move a field with the arrow keys.  Selecting a field and pressing
      an arrow key used to move the field now it just selects the next field
      making it impossible to nudge fields around.
      - Select a field(s) and then press the period key.  Now you can arrow
      the field(s) around.
      - Be careful not to bump your mouse while you are moving field with
      the arrow keys, they’ll jump around the form very quickly.  Just press
      Esc to cancel the move.
      - I just found this out 5 minutes ago… Keep pressing the period key
      and it will change what property you are changing (position, Field Width,
      Data Length)
      - Moving between fields could be really handy if I could figure out
      how to open/get to the properties without using my mouse (you
can navigate
      and set properties from the keyboard).
   - Setting the form size
      - This was another pain point until I figured out how to do it.
      - Open a form, click Layout from the menu bar then Show Actual View
      Size.  You will now have some handles to drag the form to the size you
      want.
      - Once you get used to this it is a nice feature because you have to
      purposely change the size of your form vs. using the last size
it was saved
      at.
      - One note:  Ctrl+Alt+M is supposed to toggle this mode on and off.  I
      find that I have to choose Show Actual View Size from the menu the first
      time after opening a form and then the key combination will start to work.
   - The Working Lists replaces the View By Form functionality
      - Right Click on the Working List node and select "New View by Form
      List.  Save it and add the forms you want to see.
      - Then double click the new Working List to open (Right click to edit
      the forms)
   - Single List, View by Type and View by Form
      - When you are working in a Working List or Application there are 3
      buttons in the upper right corner.  These change how the objects are
      grouped.
         - Single List:  lists all objects together.  Very nice to sort by
         Modified time and you can see all objects (Forms, Filters,
ALs, Menus) that
         were recently changed.
         -  By Type:  Groups objects by Type.  This is what we are used to
         in the Admin Tool, Forms grouped together, all Active Links grouped
         together, etc.
         - By Form:  Groups objects by their primary form.
      - Combining these with the Filter Options is a very quick way to find
      objects (copy and paste from a def/log file)
   - Outline
      - This will show all fields in the view that is active
      - Clicking a field will automatically jump that the field on the form.
      From there you can quickly click the Properties button.
      - There are two options for how you view the Outline.
         - Tree Overview:  Will show the fields in hierarchical format in
         relation to their parent container.  A page holder (AKA a panel)
         will have its pages listed below it.  Below that Attachment Pools
         and Table fields will have their attachments or column listed
below them.
         - Table Overview:  Shows Field ID, Name and Label.  You can sort by
         any of these columns!
      - Tab Order
      - You can now set the Tab Order by changing an integer property of
      fields (Select and Edit) or by clicking on the objects in the
same tab order
      you want (Increment on Click).
   - Find
      - Ctrl + F with a form open will bring up the Find Field dialog.  Here
      you can find a field by entering a Label, Name or Field ID.
   - The content assist feature
      - This is a form auto complete that many IDEs already have.
   - Ctrl+M to maximize an object and hide to other tabs.  I find that I do
   this less since I minimize the tabs first thing and have more working space.
      - Now that I think about it, this is a really quick way to minimize
      all of the tabs in bullet 1
   - Multiple field properties
      - There is more that can be done to multiple fields at once and a
      little less cumbersome.  You can grab a group of field and drag the
      handle to increase or decrease their size at once.  You can even
      select multiple fields from the Outline field list and adjust properties.
      - Obviously you can change only shared properties that make sense if
      you have different field types selected.  (Permissions, views,
      hidden/visible, label location)
   - Much more Copy and Paste capabilities.  Most properties and references
   are text fields where you can copy text.
   - Run Process library
      - You can select a run process from within the Dev Studio.  No more
      looking to the workflow guide to find the exact Run Process syntax.
      - There is even documentation as to what the RP does and some examples


HTH,

Jason

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