AltME groups: search

so they act the same .. when i bring up a vid window from rebgui 
and the other way round

Volker: no teaming up with Robert. It is my employeer, who gave me 
permission to contract Cyphre for specific things I need. But I contacted 
Robert to coordinate and possibly not overlap our efforts ...

SVN = SubVersion, the concurrent versioning system used by TortoiseSVN. 
 We have started using it to keep files synchronized. You would need 
to download and install Tortoise.

I am having a bug in a program interfacing RebGui to RebDB.

The problem is the following. The behaviour of RebGui'following commands 
having a strange effect on the data managed with RebDB:

my clear-UI function do clears a rebgui interface (simply a set of 
fields) to the RebDB data.

But clearing the 'text fields, it does also clears the values in 
the RebDB database.

At first I was using RebGui clear-text command, and tried the other 
View version just to check.
Both are doing the same thing.

Why clearing the interface fields does clears the data in the database. 
 clear-UI does not ask that.

And no instructions to do that appears in the clear-UI function, 
which is not calling any other function either.

It looks like the 'text field of the fields objects in RebGUI works 
as a direct reference to the database.

And nowhere my code calls by reference. I cannot explain that behaviour, 
nor find any hints in my code as to what causes that behaviour?

Any explanation or ideas on where to look for the cause of that behaviour?


UI-fields: [Funiqueid Fchristen-name Fsurname Fbirth Fname-prefix]
clear-UI: does [
	foreach f UI-fields [
		clear get in (get f) 'text
		show (get F)
	]
	ctx-rebgui/edit/focus (get 'Fchristen-name)
]

(rebol often lets the user copy things, because copy canbe expensive. 
And people like Carl and Ashley like to avoid that.)

That's right. This is not a RebGUI or RebDB issue, it is a Rebol 
issue that everyone needs to be aware of. If you don't copy series 
(ie. strings) then they are by reference. Use COPY a few times and 
you'll be right.

If you're in an area widget, and leave, is the caret position stored 
anywhere?  I want to try and insert text by clicking on a button 
outside the area widget were the caret was before.

the idea is to call 'refocus-edit before doing something. then you 
have the caret in both system/view/caret and face/caret. 'unfocus 
saves the caret in caret/face, so if rebol changes the focal-face 
it is keept.

'caret? is used to fetch the caret, as face/caret can still be none.

so use 'refocus-edit instead of 'focus, 'caret? to access the last 
caret.

if you want to change something, refocus and change system/view/caret. 
since the next unfocus will store that inside the face.

When there is text in a field and we do the focus on it, then the 
text is shaded black.  Is there a command where, instead of shaded 
region, the focus is simply the insertion point placed before the 
string in the field.  The shaded region presumes that we will replace 
it all with a new value.  An insertion point suggest that we will 
correct the entry.  The difference is that we do not have to systematically 
hit a left arrow key first, to correct the field.

create-distribution.r - workaround at the moment is to create two 
empty 'place-holder' scripts in widgets dir named %number-field.r 
and %drop-tree.r. This should resolve itself once Cyphre publishes 
his remaining changes ... otherwise I'll add them to SVN the next 
time I commit any [other real] changes.

Here is a litle demo how to access the caret even if on-unfocus is 
called. eg a buton is pressed. or user edits in a find-area and wants 
to search in the edit-area. works by overriding on-unfocus and  saving 
caret in face. unfortunally i was not able to do it the other way 
around. i can restore the face-caret on on-focus, but something unfocusses 
later when i do that by a button. http://polly.rebol.it/test/test/rebgui/../../test/rebgui/edit-area.r.

demo: if you set the caret and click copycar, the text on the caret 
is shown on field above.

I want to add some commands to the top window red "close" square 
button, so that I commit changes to the database and save some data 
before the close.  I can add a quit button on the interface, but 
it is still important that the top window close button do the same 
thing.  I dont see any instructions about that, neither in the RebGui 
display guide, nor the vid spec.  Can someone provide the code to 
do that, or where to find it explicitly?

remember that insert-event-func inserts the event in a block of events 
so if you run the same program multiple times from console, the event 
will be added again the next time you run it and therefore run twice.

I am unable to refresh a textlist.  My text list is defined as

Fall-ids: text-list 80x60 #HW data (db-select uniqueid contactDB) 
[
			new-cursor: rowid-of-identifier? face/selected
			valid-set: validate-cursor new-cursor
			if valid-set [show-values-of-current-cursor]
			]
And my function to refresh it is :
refresh-ids-list: does [
	Fall-ids/data: (db-select uniqueid contactDB)
	Fall-ids/redraw
]

Calling this, the data gets changed, but the textlist does not redraws 
itself?  I did try with set in Fall-dis 'data and show Fall-ids, 
without effect either. 3 hours later I am still in neverland.  Any 
Ideas?.

Thank-you, it works.  It is not clear in my head, as to why 'insert 
clear' is better than 'TheObject/Data: "NewListOfValues"', but Ill 
try to remember it by hart.  I am nearing completion of a small example 
of RebGui+RebDB app.  Last glitches are show-focus and display/close.

As for the option in display to capture the close event, how do I 
state it?  As this does not work.
Contact: compose/deep/only [
; Gui definition
]
do show-contact: does [
	display/min-size "ContactDB" Contact 680x650
	do[show-first-rowid]
	display/close [] [shutdown] ; <-- Culprit
	]
do-events

Tab (and shift-tab) changes focus. 'with is a VID construct, not 
RebGUI (unless Cyphre's changes are more far reaching than I'm aware 
of ;) )


The area in tour.r is the only tabable widget so it re-tabs to end 
of text. Try:

	display "" [area area area]


to see how it works when more than one tabable widget is/are present.

Maybe it's best to support SHIFT-TAB as TAB inside an area. Using 
TAB to navigate between fields is very common to a lot of users. 
And in other programs (like Excel) you have to use ALT-RETURN to 
insert a hard line break in a cell. Just RETURN leaves the cell.

Also committed rev#26 with support for Ctrl-Enter hard tabs, and 
removed references to drop-tree/number-field so create-distribution 
works correctly.

Oh no, sorry I misunderstood. Once the caret has left the area and 
moved to another widget the index it was at is completely lost. You 
would need to store the index on each key press, or trap the loss 
of focus and store the index then. Pressing the button would refer 
to that stored index.

click on the button, and then type in the first field, enter,  click 
the button.

you can now tab between the two fields but can not type as the window 
"0" has focus.
Odd ....

Just can't type.  And the window is not highlighted as though it 
does not have focus.

any documents about rebguis patches? AFAIK it has some to events 
and hotkeys and such.

well, it is nice to hear it from the guy, who is author of most powerfull 
grid I ever seen (well, except my favourite and needed horizontal 
scrolll, which Cyphre's version supports from now on)

>> ? help
USAGE:
    HELP 'word

DESCRIPTION:
     Prints information about words and values.
     HELP is a function value.

ARGUMENTS:
     word -- (Type: any-type)

>> do %/c/rebol/rebgui/rebgui.r
Script: "RebGUI system" (11-Jul-2005)
Script: "Untitled" (none)

>> ? help
USAGE:
    HELP 'word   word -- (Type: any-type)>>

What does this?

which basically should be display without needing a title and just 
the block...

can list-box work in mode as in html forms? You simply select value, 
and key is returned instead?

Anton - are you sure? :-) I just looked lately at the source, and 
there seems to be one param -inbound, or outbound, for drop-list 
.... inbound is set by default. Separate window - why? We have show-popup 
...

so each menu level would look less like a menu and more like a window.

uf, there is, at the very bottom ... that system is pretty denerving 
for normal typical user, who is not a developer, and can't get easily 
to source of widgets, as rebgui.r comes in despaced version ...

hmm, and if it would be put in screen face directly?

that possibility was removed ... and rebgui.r comes despaced, so 
source code is ruined

what is the metrics for box? :-) I thought it is too tall, so I ended 
up putting box 20x1, and it definitely does not seem like 1 pixel? 
:-) Is it affected by unit size?

And there are some widgets wo/. comments like http://trac.geekisp.com/rebgui/browser/widgets/bar.r

Got this error again !  third time now, and this was a screen with 
2 fields, and a couple of buttons

Referencing Henriks message in Ann-Reply "I need a way to show a 
sub-layout" and my own from 26-jun-2006


This is another point that the way 'display works is sub-optimal: 

When building a gui we need 3 actions: layout, display, event-handling.
Having these 3 as distinct actions works well.

Having 1 action for layout and 1 other for display and start of event-handling 
works.

BUT having 1 action for layout AND display doesn't make sense. Because 
you can't build sub-layouts, and you are stuck with a displayed but 
non-functional window after this step.

Anton - today I consulted with Cyphre, and it is really how I thought 
about it - drop-list, and its inside/outside argument really allows 
you to have the drop-list to go beyond the border of parent app. 
The case is, that there is simply a bug, which Cyphre nearly fixed 
(hilite stopped working)

Is there anyone else who thinks, that rounded tabs do not work? As 
well as rounded buttons? While we tried to stay WinXP look compatible 
as much as possible, in some situations, rounded buttons do not work 
- try to change tour.r background color to any of darker colors - 
those tabs look more like a leak, than real shape - simply disturbing 
a bit. I have such reaction independently confirmed by Bobik, and 
my brother objected too, without telling him what to judge ....

I've often wondered if anyone would copy the original NeXTStep style. 
I think it's wonderfully sober and boring (meant positively) to look 
at

I like the old look, because I think patterns and gradients distract 
from text too much

I prefer rounded buttons and tabs for the most part.  And square 
for all the conditions you mentioned Pekr.

There is something that people that are making frameworks on the 
web are doing that I actually really like.


They hide all the UI until your mouse is over it.  What I like about 
this is that it reduces the noise of buttons you know are there, 
like [Close], [Minimize], [Resize].  If all windows conform, and 
you can truly trust them all to allow you to do everything, then 
I think this will become the preferred state.

But it only works if the UI is 100% consistent.

I think we should nail the functionality down before worrying too 
much about the cosmetics.  Stack overflows and other issues are far 
more important to users.

And I gather Windows Vista is going to bring a whole new heap of 
problems trying to match their new GUI

ok, and when you remove it? goes it stable once again?

had to make lots of changes in the source to accomodate the new way 
of getting data viz rg/picked and rg/selected

And his error-message said in "into-widget". Thats in %rebgui-edit.r 
, looks for a tabbable face and is recursive.

A little bug is in the foreach. A pane-block can still conatin functions 
(for lists), and that is not checked.

and radio-button would need to usethat trick.

the smallest screen I've seen it on is with one radio-group and 2 
fields and 3 buttons

is the error always in 'into-widget ? Or could it be indirect recursion 
and we have to look somewhere else too?

looks in the pane and allows only object! and block!. on other things 
it returns none. especially on functions, thats why it uses 'get.

its called from 'next-field too. That recurses too. looks a bit suspicious 
to me at first read. but then the error-m,essage should sometimes 
show it and not always bail out on 'into-widget IMHO.

and back-field

This pops up a VID window .. enter some text and then "Accept"

Now shift tab ..and boom!!!

1. Highlight the first text field
2. Click on the "server" button
3. Highlight the "type here" field to give focus
4. Click on the "OK" button
the rebgui no longer has focus.
Now do tab .. and it crashes with a stack overflow.

Good work. And good night. :)

Cyphre will look into it now and post results here ...

recurses in next-field with wrap: true, and the face is always the 
focused one from the closed window. but i guess cyphre found that 
too :9

Graham: "For me, function is beauty"


As it is for me.  But your statement here implies that this issue 
is superfluous in light of deeper issues, which mischaracterizes 
the problem.   Form and function go hand in hand.  In a GUI (which 
literally implies both form and function) subtle information is transmitted 
in the cross roads of the form and the function.


Links, buttons, rounded buttons mean different things in different 
places.  To marginalize it may be myopic.


Anton: "I think that can't be good for people with vision problems. 
I say stick to the simple old ways."


We are actually going to offer both, we are actively working on this. 
 


.

Graham, I just looked into the problem. It was not caused by the 
RADIO-GROUP changes (as it crashes  even when remove the widget from 
your layout). And yes, Volker's quick fix looks good to me ;-)

Yes, I came to that conclusion.  I think I updated Rebgui with the 
tab changes and the radio group changes at the same time.

I want to add a row to a table but I don't want to keep a special 
block containing all the table values. How to do it? I only can get 
one entry added and than it's reused. Looks like some sharing is 
happening.

This patch solves the problem:

if found? [
	pane/data: - para/scroll/y / (total - visible)
]

in the scroll-line and sroll-page functions

Robert, have a look at %tour.r to see how it adds rows to a table 
(and refreshes).

I do. Table is good for text-only multiple column rows where you 
don't need cell-level addressing. Grid will satisfy those who need 
something more complex ... but don't confuse functionality/complexity 
with "better". Table meets *my* needs, Grid meets *yours*; and folks 
can choose to use the most appropriate one for the task at hand. 
Choice is good.

I do not need cell level adressing. It could be even enought with 
simple list. It seems that in begginging I will use them and for 
statuss changes use just some part of text or some symbols:
F.ex:
Msg#1 2006-Jun-01 Unread
Msg#2 2006-Jun-01 Read


But any way -  what could you recoment to use for scrollable list 
with either changeable colors, font styles or including some small 
icon?

(Just posted table and couple of fixes and enhancments to SVN.)

Hi, I would like to get some feedback on some rebgui-grid decision. 
The thing is, I need to do it till tomorrow, to stabilise a bit and 
go for more final version ....

The thing is - one one hand, I don't want grid to be as capable (and 
big) as Henrik's grid, otoh it would be good to offer some functionality 
commonly needed for DB apps ....

The issue I am trying to currently adress, is that of (non)modifying 
original data block, and here come some questions ....

I'm doing that in LIST-VIEW and it can easily be done fast enough, 
if you are worried about performance.

virtual access of both rows and columns

how do you solve possible change to amount of data? My friend working 
with SAP grid suggested to me simply keep index block, and assign 
each record a recno virtually, as with update, in multiuser system, 
there could come some new records, or some may disappear ....

if I have two real columns: height and width, I can't produce an 
area column with the product of the two first columns and show that 
next to the first two columns.

in my experience, data manipulation is never a performance issue. 
what is a performance issue, is related to VID and SHOW

if SHOW was much faster, LIST-VIEW could be insanely fast. you could 
probably easily scroll a 50x50 array in fullscreen 1024x768 at 25-40 
fps. I've noticed that when doing manipulations when not updating, 
such as sorting and moving entries in one go, these things are close 
to instant. The MOVE-ROW-UP/DOWN operations work like that.

I find that having looked at thousands of spreadsheets, most are 
not larger than 50x25, or 25x50.  The exception is when people are 
dumping databases, and those are not using fomulas, but rather are 
for working out data.  This is done by programmers, not by users 
in general.

Petr: IMO you need to decide, do you have all the data in memory 
or not. If it's up to 10.000 lines and 10 columns you shoul be able 
to do this. Than per line one block. Either have the block contain 
only values (that position matters) or use a name/value pair. Than 
it doesn't. Going for name/value pairs with hash! should be pretty 
fast.

And, I find it simpelst to have the data on the screen and in the 
program in sync. Sorting should alter the data block as well. If 
I pick the first line, I want to pick the first record. Of course 
using an API for indirection is OK too. But than do it always and 
for everything. No direct access to the record data.

otherwise you will have side-effects the developer must know about... 
and that's maintenance horror.

... without the need to adapt block to any other format. However, 
I think I decided to not modify original data block, and one of the 
reasons is easy call to update sql from the row. If I let user change 
order of  fields directly, the update could be a bit tricky, without 
knowing which field is on particular position.

If I let user change order of  fields directly

 ... is this a requirement? I've never met an end user who ever wanted 
 or needed to change order of columns ... good UI design will present 
 only the columns and rows needed, and in the most appropriate order. 
 "Appropriate" could be by order of importance, logical sequence (e.g. 
 street number followed by street name), or tied back to an "external" 
 order/sequence (e.g. another application, paper-based forms, etc).


I think something like grid is far easier to over-engineer than under-engineer! 
;)

Ashley - I don't know how many users you met, or how are particular 
users' habits in various countries, but I can guarantee you, that 
we had pretty powerfull grid even 10 years ago in Clipper (DBase 
era). I should dig some app and make a screen-shot probably :-) Even 
in DOS, our grid allowed to freeze some columns, each user could 
set its own column order, add available column or hide it, set column 
width, and save it - for each DB. It was pretty heavily used.....

Ashley is making the same point I am, "end user" vs. programmer (or 
tech).  Any time a programmer says "I do X all the time" all I think 
is that if "I can bottle the exact opposite of X I can make a billion 
dollars."


Hence I wrote above "The exception is when people are dumping databases, 
and those are not using formulas, but rather are for working out 
data.  This is done by programmers, not by users in general."


Never-the-less, if the goal here is the goal, which is for technical 
people to do this, we all still need a solve, which is speed to do 
it.


In Qtask we did part on the server, and part on the client.  So, 
we let you sort columns locally, but would send all the data to the 
server.  What we learned is:

The server would send down all the data.  Slow, but needed.
Then JS would arrange everything into a table.  Slow but needed.

Then JS would sort.  And we allowed 4 levels of sort… Slow, slow, 
slow, and turns out, not so needed.


It turns out that with anything more than about 20 lines it was better 
in the long run to just sort form the server side.


This is not to say this is how this will work where with Rebol.  
My point is more to the idea of playing with UI until you strike 
the right balance of speed and convenience.

Is it because it is a function and not a path?

Cyphre and I have continued to fix bugs and enhance RebGUI. We still 
have some bugs to fix but than it's time for a new release. As new 
widgets we have done a CHART widget that lets you do bar, pie, torus 
charts.

I juast didn't find the the manual at the time, and I seemed to remember 
that it was something really, really advanced, ... and I got only 
2 hours of sleep last night, and ...

Hmm, I want to position the caret, by clicking in a text-list, which 
lists sections of the document.
The action in my text-list
[
         __picked: first face/picked
         show-focus ar-text

         system/view/caret: at ar-text/text sections/:__picked/pos
         show ar-text
      ]

now, when I click into the text-list, ar-text is focused, and the 
caret is shown in my ar-text, but when I release the mouse-key, the 
text-list is focused again.
What can I do here?

display "Test button focus to area" [
   button "Pos" [
      show-focus ar-text
      system/view/caret: at ar-text/text 10
      show ar-text
   ]
   ar-text: area {1234567890

When I click on the button, the caret is positioned between 9 and 
0,

but when I release the button, the focus changes back to the button}
]
do-events

Not exactly. What I want is, that clicking on the button focuses 
the area, and that I am now able to directly type in the area.

and, at the given position, yes.

I'll try to do some patching now ... sorry, I'm on a modem line, 
and need to be erachable by phone, so bye for now.

No, shouldn't be. Just the little tab faces themselves are removed 
and forgotten.

Sorry, I have some connection problems, so here's the second part 
to above message ... again ... ;-)

When I run the above posted snippet, and click on the text-list, 
I get an output of "action", so the action block is run, not the 
changed engage function.

The 'probe shows, that the engage function has been changed in the 
way I have defined it.

So it seems, that RebGUI holds to an old version of engage for text-lists.

do you have a little bug too on widget table. when i run tour.r and 
select  list    text-list  and do a maxime of the windows, the little 
line between two column still stay little !!!!!  (excuse me for ma 
english :-p)

http://trac.geekisp.com/rebgui- view existing tickets and if not 
there, please add it.

Is there a way to trigger an action when the table row changes highlight? 
 If I reorder things using the column headers, the highlight changes 
and I want to initiate an action based upon that.