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Home » Community » Newbie corner » Form Designer
| Form Designer [message #24923] |
Thu, 04 February 2010 20:37  |
gedumer
Messages: 21
Registered: March 2006
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Promising Member |
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I've used other form designers, but I just can't figure this one out. How do I create a menu? How do I add an image to a button? Where do I get images from? Can I load them from a file or do I have to create everything in the image editor? Can I import images into the editor? Do you have "resource" files for images? Where do I handle events? Where are all the properties for the controls? For example... Button ony has "text", "tip", and "font". What about the rest of it? I just can't find things.
Help?
[Updated on: Thu, 04 February 2010 21:48] Report message to a moderator |
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| Re: Form Designer [message #24927 is a reply to message #24926] |
Fri, 05 February 2010 00:14  |
Didier
Messages: 690
Registered: November 2008
Location: France
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Contributor |
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Hi !
To open the form designer: add a xxx.lay layout file in the project.
Select the added file ==> the form designer (==layout editor) opens.
The Layout editor only allows to set the layout of widgets and set (some) properties.
All the rest has to coded but is quite easy though.
To add an image to a button:
myButtonInstance.SetImage( image );
where 'myButtonInstance' comes from the layout designer when you use something like:
class MyClass : public WithMyLayout<TopWindow>
The image can be retreived from internal images by using :
where 'MyImgIml' is the name of the class associated to an '.iml' file included in the project. But you need to have the associated declarations in you're code
//in a header file
#define IMAGECLASS MyImgIml
#define IMAGEFILE <MyProject/MyImlFile.iml>
#include <Draw/iml_header.h>
// in one source file
#define IMAGECLASS MyImgIml
#define IMAGEFILE <MyProject/MyImlFile.iml>
#include <Draw/iml_source.h>
[Updated on: Fri, 05 February 2010 00:15] Report message to a moderator |
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| Re: Form Designer [message #24930 is a reply to message #24929] |
Fri, 05 February 2010 03:57 |
alendar
Messages: 47
Registered: January 2010
Location: Idaho, USA
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Member |
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Took me a while to figure it out, but its pretty cool once you do. Take a look at the examples and its straight forward.
1) insert a lay file into your project. You do that by right clicking in the bottom-left frame and selecting "Insert Package Directory File(s)". That was not intuitive for a while. I tried U++ a few months ago and that pissed me off so much I dumped it and went back to struggling with VC. Now I've been more tolerant of the product and its just "Not Microsoft". Plus its free so I can't expect it to behave like a $3,000 product. In fact IMO its better because I've been able to create some fun code, once I got past the little things.
2) Select the file, which opens it. You may have to press Ctrl+T if you see text. Then right-click in the grid and select an object to add. Again, the right-click to add frustrated me for a few seconds, but I got over it. The rubber band lines annoyed me too, until I figured out they actually made life VERY easy! Simply click on/off to lock it to that side of the window. Very slick.
U++ focuses on the things developers want to generally do, instead of trying to force you to use some new hair-brained framework, like ATL or WTL or MFC or WinForms or Managed C++ and .NET VBX then OCX then COM and OLE2 then ActiveX then I don't remember what.
3) name each item. These automagically become members in the class you include the layout in.
4) Create a window class (use an example). All it is is class W : public WithXXXLayout<TopWindow>.
5) Drop this in your constructor:
CtrlLayout(*this, "Title");
or CtrlLayoutOk or OkCancel.
You do have to be careful about window sizing code being after or before the Layout macro.
6) Then you .Run() the window from your Main.
Total Cake.
Now in your constructor, you type one of your objects and poof - you get a context-sensitive popup of all the bases of your window.
To do a menu:
1) Something like this in your class def:
MenuBar menuFrame; // Horizontal stack
void constructMenuFrame() {
AddFrame(menuFrame);
menuFrame.Set(THISBACK(menuFrameCallback));
}
void menuFrameCallback(Bar& bar) {
bar.Add("File", THISBACK(FileMenu));
bar.Add("Edit", THISBACK(EditMenu));
bar.Add("View", THISBACK(ViewMenu));
bar.Add("Help", THISBACK(HelpMenu));
void HelpMenu(Bar& bar) {
bar.Add("About Jammit", THISBACK(About));
}
void About() {
aboutWindow.Open(); }
2) Generate it in your constructor.
constructMenuFrame();
Can't get any easier.
Oh, to get callbacks you'll need this in your window class:
typedef MainWin CLASSNAME;
This is a simple thing that allows TopWindow or some such to generate the proper function call.
Other things.
1) Drop a file with extension ".rc" in there and U++ picks it up.
2) Drop an IML file in there and all your images are available.
I put this in my project share header:
#define IMAGECLASS MyImages
#define IMAGEFILE "project.iml"
#include <Draw/iml.h>
Then to set the icon I just go "this->LargeIcon(MyImages::bigmainicon);" in my window class.
That sets the Taskbar icon. The regular app icon I set in the resource file.
I threw a little Icon on a push button with:
playOrPause = MyImages::play();
On clicking I do "playOrPause = MyImages::pause()"
One learning curve issue is that the writers overrode more operators than a new rooster in a henhouse. The "~" was a surprise to me, but its fine if you just Alt+O to it and view the implementation.
Callbacks are so easy I'm very impressed. Qt's method seems much more complex.
One thing obviously better than MSVC: You can easily extend anything. I extended TopWindow without blinking. A few fanagles with default constructors, the close method, and such.
Now I have my own little custom Window wrapper. Try doin that in VC. Subclassing is a major effort.
cd7651feeb698f6ac6cec1f6deda5e5b
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| Re: Form Designer [message #24935 is a reply to message #24933] |
Fri, 05 February 2010 09:13 |
cbpporter
Messages: 1412
Registered: September 2007
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Ultimate Contributor |
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Hi gedumer,
You are right about some of these tools being counterintuitive, but this is not just the sign of less then perfect GUI design of the tools, but a reflection of different kind of objects and work flow.
Both the image designer and layout designer don't save some binary files, edit your source code or otherwise magically do the stuff you want. They edit the ".lay" and ".iml" files, which are C++ code. So opening up the editor without an associated file doesn't make that much sense. I guess you could open a new empty document and use "Save As" to save it to disk to be more like other tools, but I don't know if it is worth the effort.
Menus are a different subject. This is not like Delphi, where every menu item has its own variable. You only have access to the Menubar object, and you create a menu with callbacks. also, you do not add the main menu in the designer, you add it as a frame in code. Frames are hard to understand initially, but they offer huge benefits. Frames reduce the active surface of any widget and insert there another widget. This means that you can add a menu, a border or pretty much anything you desire to any widget, and the widget doesn't have to know about the frame, or take measures to update its size and behavior.
So the layout editor should not be used for menus and toolbars.
Also, the layout editor is a little bit poor on features and doesn't offer all the options that you would like. I think this is intentional, but I don't agree with this. Right now you set between 60% and 90% of properties in the editor, depending on widget, and the rest in code. This may or may not be improved in the future.
Also important, you must right click on the layout editor to insert a widget. Again, a miss feature, but I don't have time to improve this, and also once you learn it, it won't bother you anymore.
While the layout editor might not be as user friendly, it is very strong. You can apply your layouts to anything, including a Button or EditBox. While this is not that useful for Buttons, it is great with your custom widgets. Great feature that one learns to appreciate and rely upon.
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| Re: Form Designer [message #24944 is a reply to message #24935] |
Fri, 05 February 2010 13:39 |
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mirek
Messages: 14112
Registered: November 2005
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Ultimate Member |
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| cbpporter wrote on Fri, 05 February 2010 03:13 |
also, you do not add the main menu in the designer, you add it as a frame in code.
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Actually, you can. MenuBar can work both as Frame or as normal child widget.
I use it as child in almost all of my commercial apps - if your main window is dialog based, it is usually easier to add menu as child.
| Quote: |
Also important, you must right click on the layout editor to insert a widget. Again, a miss feature, but I don't have time to improve this, and also once you learn it, it won't bother you anymore.
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What do you suggest? Left click? Note that I wanted to avoid "palette" of widgets - too much space on the screen.
(I am serious in asking here. I agree right-click is confusing for newbies).
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| Re: Form Designer [message #24945 is a reply to message #24944] |
Fri, 05 February 2010 14:09 |
cbpporter
Messages: 1412
Registered: September 2007
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Ultimate Contributor |
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| luzr wrote on Fri, 05 February 2010 14:39 |
Actually, you can. MenuBar can work both as Frame or as normal child widget.
I use it as child in almost all of my commercial apps - if your main window is dialog based, it is usually easier to add menu as child.
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I know that you can add it technically as a child, but you really can't add in in practice. Too much work. Without frame you would need to add resizing in Layout to handle main window resizing. Non-resizable dialogs are dead and a sign of very poor modern GUI design, and so are menus without some kind of frame separating them from the rest of the GUI. If I don't add menus in a frame, how can I add a TopSeparatorFrame without resizing code?
| Quote: |
What do you suggest? Left click? Note that I wanted to avoid "palette" of widgets - too much space on the screen.
(I am serious in asking here. I agree right-click is confusing for newbies).
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Yes, "pallete" would be the only non confusing one. Tabbed pallete like Delpi is two lines wide an can contain hundreds of widgets. But I'm used with right clicking, even if after so much time I need to search for my widgets. But I think all widgets should be added, Option should have a a checked value in the properties editor, etc. Actually copying the Delphi/Visual C# properties editor would be IMO best.
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