U++ forum: Welcome to the forum

Re: A (maybe) dummy idea about widgets and control manager [message #11498 is a reply to message #11497]

Sat, 15 September 2007 23:25

mirek
Messages: 13975
Registered: November 2005

Ultimate Member

mdelfede wrote on Sat, 15 September 2007 16:59

I started playing with the idea above; a little change in CtrlCore.h (ignoremouse = 1 if in designer), few code lines and widgets are created, moved and resized on my code main window.

So far, this works statically, so you must know in advance (ide compile time) the classes of widgets.

Next step would be creation by class name, and property set/get/list, which requires RTTI and a bit more coding but is manageable too. That would require some changes to existing controls, too, in order to 'export' the properties.
That would allow to instantiate controls by name (aka string), so they may be unknown at compile time.

A step further, controls linked dynamically; that's very platform / compiler dependent. On Linux, a good start is here :

http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/3687

On windoze, there are many more advanced DLL functions to deal with dynamic module loading/executing.

All that would allow to deploy controls (I'd call them components) as an include file + a precompiled shared library, that could be imported inside the ide with an 'import control' command. All without recompiling anything,

Again, if you think it's worth the effort, I can try to go further.

Well, I think that it is step back compared to current solution.

IMO, doing .usc part is really simple - almost as simple as implementing design mode for widget (that one does not come for free too - I know that because 4 years ago, we were using exactly this approach).

Maybe the reason why there are still missing .usc files is simply rather the fact that except for the most frequently used widgets, it is not really worth the effort for anything practical.

Just a note, U++ origins rather lie with disappointment with "Visual tools". It is really intended as non-visual library, only using basic visual design for the parts where it makes sense.

Well, over time, it evolved a bit... But I do not see any *practical* advantage for such solution, and believe me, I produce up to 20 dialogs / week for money...

The fact that sometimes I need to use "User class" does not really bother me a lot..

Mirek

Report message to a moderator