Getting Started

One of the most important things when building systems is where to start, however this is not as important as actually starting.

Luckily, adopting Flexiva as your front-end application, means that you have already eliminated a huge amount of design, engineering and learning because Flexiva is built on around 150 man years of software engineering, and around 1.5 million lines of industrial strength back-end and front-end code, used by thousands of customers for decades.

Starting the integration of your ReST API should therefore be the creation of your first data source request.

Keep it Simple

We recommend choosing a simple ReST API with as few foreign key dependencies as possible to start.

Our goal here is to create the data source, then consume that in a lookup form grid to visualise the data sourced from the back-end.

This is a simple process with very few steps:

Create the Data Source

Use this App Studio configurator to integrate the ReST API.

Create Forms

Use this App Studio configurator to create forms, and design them with components linked to data sources.

Add to Navigation Bar

Use this App Studio configurator to link menu items to new forms.

Test

Thoroughly test all CRUD operations for our ReST API.

Prerequisites

If you have signed-up and are logged in to the reference app, then you may wish to remove all of the samples from your database before building them all from scratch using the process described next.

WARNING: These are destructive actions and you will be unable to use the sample app forms until after you have re-created them.

Remove Forms

To remove all sample forms, open App Studio and select the Forms configurator:

Select each form in turn, then use the Delete button repeatedly, and confirm until all sample forms are removed. Apply & Close to make them disappear.

Remove Navigation Bar Forms

To remove all sample navigation bar groups, open App Studio and select the Navigation Bar configurator:

Select each of these 2 highlighted groups in turn, then use the Delete button repeatedly, and confirm until all sample nav bar groups are removed. Apply & Close to make them disappear.

Remove Add Menu Forms

To remove all sample add menu items, open App Studio and select the App Toolbar configurator:

Select each of the forms beneath the Add node in turn, then use the Delete button repeatedly, and confirm until all sample add menu items are removed. Apply & Close to make them disappear.

Remove Custom Buttons

To remove all sample custom buttons, open App Studio and select the App Toolbar configurator:

Select each of the forms beneath the Custom Buttons node in turn, then use the Delete button repeatedly, and confirm until all custom buttons are removed. Apply & Close to make them disappear.

Remove Activity Metrics

To remove all sample activity metrics, open App Studio and select the Activity Metrics configurator:

Select each of the forms beneath the Activity Metrics node in turn, then use the Delete button repeatedly, and confirm until all activity metrics are removed. Apply & Close to make them disappear.

Remove Data Sources

To remove all sample data sources, open App Studio and select the Data Sources configurator:

WARNING: This is the most destructive action in the App Studio so take great care.

Select the RestDB.io data source, then use the Delete button, and confirm. Every folder, sub-folders and data source request will be removed.

Remove Custom Variables

To remove all sample activity metrics, open App Studio and select the Custom Variables configurator:

Select the left column header to select all Client variables, then press the Delete button:

Click Yes and keep selecting all Client variables and deleting until they have all been removed.

Sample Configuration Removed

Once you have removed all of the sample forms, toolbar items, nav bar items, add items, custom variables and data sources, your application will look like this:

You are now ready to commence re-building the samples from scratch, or indeed integrating your own ReST API's.