ACC: Form Appears Blank When Opened Except for Header

• Microsoft Access versions 1.0, 1.1, 2.0, 7.0, 97

SYMPTOMS

Novice: Requires knowledge of the user interface on single-user computers.

When you open a form in Form view, the form is completely blank. There are no controls or text; everything is blank except for the form header.

CAUSE

The form footer may be too large for the form, and it may be covering the entire detail section when you view the form.

Also, if you have a form that is read-only and there is no data in the underlying recordset, no controls will be shown.

RESOLUTION

If the problem is with the form footer, shorten the footer to allow only enough space for any controls that may appear there. If there is no data, controls in the form footer or header will be visible.

MORE INFORMATION

There are other reasons why a form may open and appear to be blank. Typically, this happens because the underlying recordset contains no records or privileges have been limited. However, an oversized form footer can also cause this behavior to occur.

Steps to Reproduce Behavior

1. Open the sample database Northwind.mdb (or NWIND.MDB in versions 1.x and 2.0), and open the Categories form in Design view.

2. On the View menu (the Format menu in version 2.0, or the Layout menu in version 1.x), click Form Hdr/Ftr to add a header and footer to the form.

3. Extend the length of the footer to at least 5 inches (place no controls in the footer).

4. View the form in Form view. Note that the form appears to be blank.

REFERENCES

For more information about why a form might appear to be blank, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: