When starting, the program SIPalm scans your Palm in search of a database of its format, and at the same time, in order you won't have a tedious time, it displays its splash screen (Fig.1.1).

If SIPalm cannot find any suitable DB, you will see a message about loading error (Fig.1.2). For its correction you just have to upload the database in the SmartItems format to your Palm, having previously converted it to Palm format using the subjoined utility SIConverter.

Fig.1.1 Splash screen.	Fig.1.2 Error database open.	Fig.1.3 Start form.

If at least one database in the SmartItems format is already loaded to your Palm, you see its Start form (Fig.1.3).

In this form you can select for viewing one of the found databases (in case there are several of them) using combo box. Right after that the following information about the selected database will be displayed in the form: the database name, its author, the number of records and the date of its last editing.

After you have selected the database you'd like to view, it is time to turn to next forms. There are two forms which are available from the start form: filter form and browser form.

Fig.2.1 The view of the category tree.	Fig.2.2 Records search.	Fig.2.3 Search finish.

This form is used for searching and filtering records by some feature or condition, the choice of appropriate tools is quite wide. There are conditions for searching records written during last day, week or month. You can also find records referring to certain categories. General view of the form is shown in the picture (Fig.2.1).

And, what is the most interesting, you can see, who has borrowed your items, when, and what are they. The debtor list appears automatically in the folder 'Debtors' (of course if they exist, but if you are lucky and nobody owes you something, this folder will not even appear).

A line for advanced search is also provided. It works slower, but at the same time you can enter requests here which cannot be created using the directory tree.

At the bottom of the form there are three buttons. Clicking on the button 'Home' takes you back to the start form. The button 'Apply' sets a filter with the specified parameters. Note, that conditions inside the category tree are combined (logical OR), and the conditions of the category tree and the command line are intersected (logical AND). After clicking on this button, it changes automatically to 'Reverse'. Clicking on the button 'Reverse' causes filter canceling and returning automatically to the condition 'Apply'. Returning to 'Apply' also happens after changing filter parameters. Clicking on the button 'Browse' takes you to the browser form.

The category tree occupies the main part of the form. You can select and deselect categories by minimizing and maximizing branches, thus preparing a query to the database.

When you tick off (or deselect) a category, de-selection occurs automatically in all attached categories. After clicking on the 'Apply' button, SIPalm performs search in all categories selected in the category tree.

There are two constant folders ('Debtors' and 'New') in the category tree.

The folder 'Debtors' appears only in case, if at present there are some persons who have borrowed some items from you and haven't returned them yet. You can just look through the debtors list or choose a debtor (or several debtors) and find out what items you have lent him (them).

The folder 'New' exists always, it contains three categories: 'Day', 'Week' and 'Month'. Selecting one of them, you can see what you have bought during the last day, week or month respectively. Advanced data search can be performed from the command line.

The rest categories are not obligatory, and you can create and delete them at your wish (using SIWin). Category search will be performed only if you have indicated the categories to which your items belong.

There is a more complicated and slow tool which provides more search capabilities, - the command line. It is located strictly above the category tree.

After filter parameters setting (with the help of the category tree, or the command line, or both) and clicking on the button 'Apply', SIPalm starts searching according to your request and displays sand-glass as a confirmation (Fig.2.2). After the search is finished, a message appears (Fig.2.3), where you can see the quantity of the found records. To look through the found records, close the dialog and click on the button 'Browse' in the search form. Thus you go to the browser form, but only the found records will be accessible.

Fig.3.1 The view of the browser form.	Fig.3.2 The view of the data form.

This form is used for displaying the records found during the search (or all records if no filters are set). Opening the form, you see the folder list in the folder tree root (Fig. 3.1). The distinguishing feature of a folder is presence in front of a folder name of a figure in brackets indicating the quantity of records in this folder (and if a filter was applied - the quantity of records satisfying the filter condition).

The following can happen: after applying a filter it notifies you that it has found some records satisfying the search conditions, but in the browser you see only folders with zeros. This is ok, this just means that there are really no records satisfying the conditions in the folders you see, but there are attached folders in them where you can find the required records.

Each record is represented by a field value, which was specified as a field by default. Therefore you ought to care about the field value by default. If you select unproper field as a field by default, there can be difficulties with record recognition when viewing the database, and you will have to look through all the information for each record, which is very slow and not very convenient.

Make a single click on a folder to enter it. To return to the upper level, perform a single click on the upper line with the value "..".

There are three control buttons in the form: 'Home', 'Filter' and 'Flat/Foldårs'.

Clicking on the button 'Home' takes you back to the start form, and you can select another database for viewing.

Clicking on the button 'Filter' takes you to the filter form to modify filter parameters or just to switch off the filter.

The button 'Flat/Foldårs' allows you to enter record view mode (and go back) without taking directories into consideration. This is the greatest feature of our viewers. The flat mode simplifies record searching or viewing the whole database in case of a branched directory system, when you do not remember exactly where you have saved the necessary data. In the flat mode you can see all database records in one list. But this can be not so convenient if the database is huge. In this case you can set a filter to decrease the quantity of visible records and continue viewing.

This form is the most simple and appears after a single click on a record in the browser form. This form displays all information about this record, even date and time of its creation (Fig. 3.2).

You should remember that during database converting to the Palm format, all fields which cannot be properly displayed with Palm are deleted. Such fields are 'Memo', 'ListView', 'Pictures' and 'HTML'.

The field names are signed with points in order to distinguish these fields from the data.

If there is not enough place on the Palm screen for displaying all output information, then with the help of up and down arrows appearing in the corners you can look through all data that is hidden from your glance.

Having completed data viewing, click on the button 'OK' to go back to the browser form.