Home » U++ Library support » U++ Widgets - General questions or Mixed problems » Update impossible?
| Update impossible? [message #8716] |
Tue, 27 March 2007 09:40  |
WebChaot
Messages: 53
Registered: September 2006
Location: Austria, Vienna
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Hi all!
Currently I need to implement some windows specific gui things, like outlook 2003 or 2007 style, a navigation bar known from outlook and something else.
Therefore I need to edit directly the widget codes and enhance them for my needs.
Am I right, when I say, its nearly impossible to update to a newer release, when I made these changes - or to redo all these changes on every update?
I only want to be sure, that this is right. Then I will have to choose a stable version (the last one?) and stay with this for some time.
Ultimate++ is a very good platform. It makes small and fast code and (for a formerly delphi programmer  its the best platform to switch to c and use the cross platform possibilities.
On the other hand (as you wrote somewhere in this forum), the widgets are only raw modules which have to be adapted for specific use. Which means - all widgets, which are not standard have to be coded by myself.
Thats not the problem (ok - for me it's a problem, because I'm not the "native" c-programmer - but its possible), but then you can't update to newer version without reimplement all the changes done before.
I dont know, how large the community is, but maybe it would make sense to develop some more sophisticated widgets and styles. From your point of view, office look, a navigation bar or dockable toolbars are not "standard" widgets - but for windows developers this is (a forced) standard. 
Or in other words. I want to develop a client which runs under some platforms. This is quite easy with ultimate. But a windows client nowadays needs to be "blue" and office styled and have to offer all the useful widgets the users are used to find (navbar, planner widget, ...).
I think, this is a major drawback, why ulitmate is not so much in use as it could be. I think, some users are spoiled from other development platforms (me too  and they expect a little bit more to switch to ultimate for their future projects.
Im interested, what others say about this topic.
WebChaot.
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| Re: Update impossible? [message #8719 is a reply to message #8716] |
Tue, 27 March 2007 11:27  |
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| WebChaot wrote on Tue, 27 March 2007 03:40 |
Hi all!
Currently I need to implement some windows specific gui things, like outlook 2003 or 2007 style, a navigation bar known from outlook and something else.
Therefore I need to edit directly the widget codes and enhance them for my needs.
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Enhanincg core code is not a good idea. Why you need this? Can't you just make your own widget derived from base Ctrl class with your own Paint. 2003/2007 office style have nothing in common with native widgets so creating your own widget is the best way IMO in this case. Am I right?
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| Re: Update impossible? [message #8732 is a reply to message #8716] |
Wed, 28 March 2007 15:03 |
WebChaot
Messages: 53
Registered: September 2006
Location: Austria, Vienna
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Hi Mirek!
Thanks for answer.
>>> I think this is your first option. Maybe in the process you will create "blue office style" chameleon skin useful for others.
I'm happy, that I can use the widgets to my needs. I'm really proud, that I developed a derived arrayctrl with new functions. But as you know from my last posts, I'm not able to implement new designs.
But I think, that would not help, because many things in the components should be drawn by code - and some widgets must work a little bit different like the standard ones (e.g. the toolbars should not wrap, when space is too short - they should hide the buttons and display a drop arrow on right side).
Sorry - I want to give something back to the community, but at the moment I dont have the experience to do that in a professional way - so it wouldnt help anybody.
>>> Make your copy of widget, *rename* it (to e.g. MyDropList) and apply your changes. Keep in separate package (MyCtrlLib).
I will do what you suggested. I will copy all CtrlLib-Widgets and extend the paint-methods and some other things for my needs. I hope, you will not change too much in newer releases.
When I'm ready, I could upload them somewhere (here), if anybody is interested in these widgets. Perhaps somebody can help then to make them professional, because I have no idea, how to realize docking ability to toolbars for example.
What I will do in next weeks (if somebody is interested):
- Extend all widgets to look (and work) like Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2007
- Create new NavBar-Widget (as known from Outlook). I think, thats a useful widget, so I try to realize it I think, I will find some useful things in tabctrl code (also 0..n pages, where only one is visible)
- Create a planner-widget (also known from Outlook)
What I still have at the moment:
- "FrameSet" - a simple component, which creates two frames with a splitter (horizontal or vertical) between. I need them to build dynamic dialogs. Each Frame have Hide() and Show() to toggle visibility. I use them to toggle search bars or preview areas. They can be nested - so you can do, what you need. Nothing spectacular, but useful.
I will continue using ultimate, because in my opinion its a really good development platform. Maybe sometimes my skill is high enough to help the community in a productive way.
WebChaot.
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