Child components

Child components, or children, in a component definition allow you to define controls in which multiple control definitions are nested to create a compound control. Using child components allows you to reuse previously defined components in multiple locations, by referring to them in child component definitions. For example, to define a drop-down list, you define a set of selections as components and then define the list control, including the individual selections in the list control definition as child components.

In the MedML schema, many child component names end with the letters REF (for example, Userref) to indicate their use as references to previously defined components that are nested within the definition of another component.

When you include child components in the definition of a compound control, the child component definitions follow the opening element of the parent component, after the parent component attributes.