# Simple Mode: Lean Forms & Record Inspector

> Hide the fields nobody fills in, widen the form, and keep every value one click away in a searchable record inspector - per model, per role, no code.

- **What it is:** Hide the fields nobody fills in, widen the form, and keep every value one click away in a searchable record inspector - per model, per role, no code.
- **For:** Extra Tools
- **Odoo versions:** 16.0, 17.0, 18.0, 19.0, 20.0 - Community and Enterprise
- **Runs on:** Odoo.sh or Odoo you host yourself - not Odoo Online, which accepts no third-party apps
- **Price:** 99 EUR, one-time, on the Odoo Apps Store
- **Technical name:** bambooforge_simple_mode
- **Manual:** https://docs.bambooforge.dev/bambooforge_simple_mode/
- **Live demo:** https://demo20.bambooforge.dev/odoo/action-bambooforge_simple_mode.action_bf_simple_profile
- **Store page:** https://apps.odoo.com/apps/modules/20.0/bambooforge_simple_mode
- **Manual last updated:** 2026-09-21

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# Simple Mode: Lean Forms & Record Inspector

An Odoo form shows every field the developers ever added. Your people
use twelve of them. Simple Mode hides the rest - per model, per role -
widens the sheet, and gives every record an inspector that shows all of
its values, formatted and searchable, one click away.

Hiding is an interface matter, not a permission. A hidden field is still
read over RPC, still exported, still shown by the inspector. Use groups
for what people MAY see; use Simple Mode for what they see FIRST.

## The switch

Every internal user has a **Simple / Full** switch in the top bar. On,
the forms and lists lose the fields the profiles name, the sheet widens
and empty tabs fold away. Off, everything is back. The choice is saved on
the account, so it survives a new browser and a new day.

Administrators set the default for new users and can take the switch
away (Settings › General Settings › Simple Mode). Without the switch,
the setting is changed per user in Settings › Users, *Simple mode*.

## Profiles

Settings › Simple Mode › Profiles. A profile names one model and:

- **Hidden fields** - removed from every form and list of that model the
  user opens, embedded views included. Required fields are refused when
  the profile is saved, and a field the view itself marks required is
  left alone: nothing you hide can stop a save.
- **Hidden tabs and blocks** - a notebook page by its name or title, a
  block by its `name` attribute.
- **Only for groups** - empty means everybody in simple mode; otherwise
  users in any of the groups. **Except** lists users the profile never
  touches.
- **Fold empty tabs and blocks** - a tab or titled block whose every
  field is hidden disappears too.

Profiles of the same model add up. A user in simple mode gets the union
of every active profile that applies to them.

### Starter packs

Installing the app creates the **starter packs**: profiles built from a
catalogue that was checked, field by field, against a database with
every Odoo 20 Community module installed, and against what the common
tools of each department show by default - HubSpot and Zoho for
contacts and leads, QuickBooks and Xero for invoices, Shopify for
products, Asana for tasks, BambooHR for employees. A field none of them
puts on its default screen, and that fewer than one Odoo demo record in
five fills in, leaves the screen; a field any of them treats as primary
stays. Every pack carries a note saying why.

Three layers, adding up per user:

- **Core packs** - for everybody in simple mode: Contacts, Products and
  variants, Quotations and lines, Invoices and lines, Payments, Purchase
  Orders and lines, Transfers and moves, Tasks, Projects, Leads,
  Employees, Time off, Expenses, Applicants, Manufacturing orders, Bills
  of materials, Meetings, Events, Vehicles, Equipment, Repairs, Shop
  tickets. Marketing attribution, incoterms, analytic distribution,
  cash rounding, the second street line.
- **Role packs** - keyed on what a user is *not*: not an accountant
  (accounts, taxes, bank details, journals), not a sales manager
  (pricelists, terms, warehouse, forecasts), not a purchase manager, not
  an inventory manager (routes, reordering rules, prices), not a project
  manager (timing metrics, dependencies), not an HR officer (the private
  tab), not a manufacturing manager. A manager holds the clerk's group
  too, which is why a role pack says *Not for groups: manager* rather
  than *Only for groups: clerk*. A role pack whose app is not installed
  is skipped.
- **Industry pack** - one, chosen in Settings › General Settings ›
  Simple Mode: Services and consulting, Retail shop, Wholesale and
  distribution, Manufacturing, E-commerce, Non-profit. A service company
  loses weights, barcodes and stock routes; a retailer loses quotation
  policies and incoterms; a manufacturer loses point-of-sale fields.

**Apply starter packs** (Settings, and on the profile list) creates the
packs still missing - after installing more apps, or after changing the
industry. A pack already created keeps every edit you made to it; delete
it and apply again to get the catalogue's version back. Packs are marked
*From starter packs* in the profile list and carry their key.

What the benchmarks show by default, for reference:

- *Contact* (HubSpot, Zoho): name, email, phone, company, job title,
  owner, lifecycle stage, tags. Not: salutation, language, industry,
  registry number, reference code.
- *Invoice* (QuickBooks, Xero): customer, email, invoice date, due date,
  terms, lines with product, description, quantity, rate, amount, tax,
  a message. Not: incoterm, cash rounding, fiscal position, attribution.
- *Product* (Shopify): title, description, media, price, compare-at,
  cost, SKU, barcode, stock, vendor, tags, status. Not: lead times,
  routes, warnings, warehouse descriptions.
- *Task* (Asana): name, assignee, due date, project, description, tags,
  subtasks, attachments. Not: allocated hours, recurrence, milestones.
- *Employee* (BambooHR): name, job title, department, location, manager,
  hire date, status, contact, address, emergency contact. Not: commute
  distance, schooling, spouse, badge, permits.

## Suggest fields

Open a profile and press **Suggest fields**. The picker reads the model's
form, keeps every field a user could lose without breaking a save, and
measures how often each one is actually filled in on the newest records
of your own database (500 by default; 0 measures them all). Fields under
the threshold are pre-ticked; untick what the measure got wrong, tick
what it missed, and **Apply to profile**. Ticked fields join the profile,
unticked ones leave it.

Images and files are listed but never pre-ticked. Identity and steering
fields (name, state, stage, company, currency, partner, dates) are not
listed at all.

## Details: every value of the record

Every form has a **Details** button next to the cog (and the same entry
in the cog menu). The badge on it is the number of fields simple mode
took away from this form. Details lists every field of the record the
user may read - hidden ones included, marked with an eye - as a table
grouped the way the form groups them: the tabs and titled blocks first,
then *More* for fields not on the form, then *System*.

- Related records show their names; click one to open it.
- Amounts are in the record's currency, dates in the user's format,
  selections by their label.
- **Search** matches labels, technical names and values. **Show empty
  fields** and **Hidden in simple mode only** narrow the list.
- **JSON** is the raw record, ids and all, and **Copy as JSON** puts it
  on the clipboard.
- **Open the full form** opens the record with nothing hidden, for this
  screen only; the switch stays where it was. An administrator sees
  **Preview and edit** instead (below).

### What Details will never show

Details is read as the user, through every layer Odoo itself applies,
and two more of its own:

- the model's access rights and the record rules - a record the user
  may not read is refused whole;
- field-level groups - a field with `groups=` the user lacks is not
  read;
- view-level groups - a field that the views show only inside a tab,
  block or button carrying `groups=` the user lacks is left out, in
  the table and in the JSON, even though the field itself has no
  groups (the accounting tab of a contact, a total of invoices behind
  an accounting group);
- related records - a name is listed only for records the user's rules
  let them read, and the count is the count of those;
- computed fields that refuse the user (a total that reads documents
  they may not see) are skipped rather than shown;
- interface restrictions of BambooForge Access Rights Manager;
- binary fields (images, files) are never read.

## Preview and edit

An administrator opens **Preview and edit** from Details, or **Preview
on a record** on a profile and picks a record. The record's full form
opens with a banner on top; every field simple mode hides is struck
through and marked with an eye - the fields of the record and the
columns of its embedded lists alike. Click any field to hide it, click
a struck-through one to show it again; the change is saved to the
model's core pack at once (created if none exists) and applies to every
user in simple mode on their next screen. A required field without a
default is refused with a message. **Done** returns to the ordinary
form.

The preview shows what simple mode hides *from the administrator who
looks at it*: core and industry packs, and role packs whose groups they
hold. A role pack aimed at clerks is not struck through for a manager;
open the profile to see it.

## Form width and styling

Settings › General Settings › Simple Mode:

- **Form width** - Standard (Odoo's own), Wide (1440px) or Full width,
  while simple mode is on.
- **Softer form styling** - rounded sheet, a light shadow, quieter labels
  and a little more room between fields.

Both are off the moment the user switches to Full.

## Install

1. Copy `bambooforge_simple_mode` into your addons path and update the
   apps list.
2. Install *Simple Mode: Lean Forms & Record Inspector*. Starter profiles
   are created for the apps already installed.
3. Open any contact: the form is wider, a few fields are gone, and
   **Details** brings them back; **Preview and edit** shows them struck
   through on the form itself.
4. Settings › Simple Mode › Profiles to adjust; Settings › General
   Settings › Simple Mode for the defaults.

Requires only `web` and `base_setup`. No external Python or
JavaScript libraries.

## Questions people ask

****Can a hidden field still be exported?****

Yes. Simple Mode changes the screen, not the data. For real
restrictions use groups, or BambooForge Access Rights Manager, whose
hidden fields the inspector also respects.

****A user says a field is missing.****

They are in simple mode. The switch in the top bar, or *Open the full
form* from the inspector, shows everything. To keep the field, remove
it from the profile.

****Why can't I hide this field?****

It is required on the model. A form could not be saved without it.

****Does it change my views?****

No. The arch is adjusted when it is sent to the browser; nothing is
written to `ir.ui.view`, and uninstalling leaves no trace.

****Odoo 20 already shows raw record data.****

In debug mode, as a JSON blob, for developers. The inspector is for the
people who run the company: names instead of ids, amounts and dates
formatted, grouped like the form, searchable, and available without
debug mode.

## Security notes

- Profiles are read and written by *Settings › Administration* only.
- The inspector reads with the current user's rights; it cannot show a
  field or a record the user could not read elsewhere.
- The switch is a field on `res.users` every user may write on their
  own record only.

## How we make sure it works

Before every release, **33 automated checks** run against this app on Odoo 16, 17, 18, 19 and 20.
Among them:

- Inspect full mode counts nothing hidden.
- Embedded view of same model.
- Profiles are admin only.
- Dynamic required in view is kept.
- Fold and columns on synthetic archs.

The complete list is in the source you receive.

## Support

[support@bambooforge.dev](mailto:support@bambooforge.dev) - https://bambooforge.dev