Popup - Do you know when Popup forms are good?

Some people like popup forms. Some do not.

Popup modal forms are no good:

• as you can't read or edit something else in a window behind
• as they take a lot of time to load in a browser (ask any CRM 4 user)

Popup forms are good:

• as it is obvious you have an action step to perform before continuing
• as they simplify a form that has lots of fields
• if they can't get lost behind another window
• if you make them clear by dimming the background (see below)

❌ Figure: Bad example - if this was a popup form it would be easier to focus on where to look (as a minimum you would be looking at half the screen)

✅ Figure: Good example - the popup with the dimmed background is much more intuitive

For example, adding a webpart in SharePoint 2010 should use a popup form. See our suggestion to Microsoft.