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so VID has definitelly issues ... and we are still waiting for "to 
be soon made announcement (tm September 2005)" about what's the plan 
for VID ...

then your work is turning into debuggin and finding workarounds, 
instead of concentrating upon development .... I am not sure other 
toolkits as Qt are so inconsistent ....

the thing is: what can we do about it right now? not much, other 
than either wait, or come up with sneaky solutions on our own. some 
did a solution and made RebGUI. I made LIST-VIEW, because I needed 
it and that's really the only way forward. Carl can't work on 50 
things simultaneously (or can he?) and designing a new VID, I don't 
think Carl can do that in an afternoon.

This is what we have now, and we better make best use of it, no matter 
the shortcomings

besides: read Announce and see if there are some critical VID bugs 
not in RAMBO

Carl is calling for bug to fix and (if possible) the fix for it for 
View 1.3.3.

I f you want it to be solved in next relase, just take some time 
to investigate and implemented missing accessors as you want them 
to work.

I dislike people who just go voting (half an hour) and complain during 
five years against their candidate.
On est jamais mieux servi que par soi même

go to RAMBO and check for my name and you will see that once I find 
a bug, I report it ... not to mention tonnes of my reports in earlier 
days ....

you should be carefull to your statements, as some ppl simply use 
REBOL as a tool, nothing more. Not like us. And to them your claims 
will become arrogant ...

it was never fixed and it is still in Core ...

... just look at my ticket and you will find out, where is the problem 
... :-)

petr, the ticket is there and won't be forgotten. there's no problem 
with that. but, to fix the red icon problem you need more than that 
- you also need to release a new version of ios.

Probably yes. (and doesn't sound silly).

Actually, my idea was to have a FIELD style with DRAWn text without 
having to write my on CARET-TO-OFFSET and OFFSET-TO-CARET as mezzanines. 
Maybe that's a bit over-the-top, though.

CARET-TO-OFFSET and OFFSET-TO-CARET

Hi Anton, about the list bug with sqlite. We were both right. It 
_is_ a series copy bug. And it _is_ an sql problem ... sql reuses 
the series it has given as a return value on the next call :-(

Yep, just use to-image and save it.

Is it possible use fonts which are not installed? (under windows, 
at the moment) 

I have a dir with lots of font files, and would like to write a font 
preview utility for it, but as these fonts are not installed, I would 
have to reference the font-files, not the name.

There was some discussion and a couple of scripts on the ML some 
time back about this: http://www.rebol.org/cgi-bin/cgiwrap/rebol/ml-display-thread.r?m=rmlYDRQ

Anton..intresting.. I see two things I actualy never use in Layouts 
(I mostly use Faces directly) that is the init: [] and 'with

But i actualy like the felixibilty of 'layout function there are 
more ways to combine layout and make face ...intresting if your not 
like to reinvent /vid again ...

1) copying it all into a block and append
2) using make face layout inside a layout
3) using a layout with a make face with
??

Hi Rebolinth, there's a compromise between the low-level MAKE FACE 
and the LAYOUT [] approach for single faces called MAKE-FACE. It's 
basically a way to create single faces using the VID style name and 
a spec block for of specifying facets. Of course, MAKE FACE should 
have the lowest overhead, whereas - just as it says - LAYOUT is more 
for describing whole layouts. You may find MAKE-FACE slightly easier 
to create VID-compatble faces without getting into too much detail.

and everything in that block is equivalent to working with an object 
block, so you can put in functions, etc. and all the variables are 
bound to the face

which makes it look crude and simple and unprofessional

Change the space -5 to -2 and it looks better.

second, I use pane switching a lot and it's a hassle to write your 
own routines for that all the time. it should be much simpler.

Just write a couple of functions, face-to-front and face-to-back 
and you can reuse them many times.

The point is that it should be easy for everyone to do this. VID 
does not offer a standardized way to do this and you need to study 
how to switch layouts in panes, etc. It should work out of the box

someone wante graphing, dunno what group was it posted in - one interesting 
project using AGG and Python - Matplotlib - done using AGG - http://matplotlib.sourceforge.net/screenshots.html

I see. The examples are in matplotlib syntax. And matplotlib is a 
python 2D plotting library. So, as you say, it's probably better 
to find the best plotting library (or make a new one), than making 
an implementation of matplotlib. It could be the best one around 
though.

And not just Flash - http://www.applecore99.com/api/api012.asp

Twips are screen-independent units to ensure that the proportion 
of screen elements are the same on all display systems. A twip is 
defined as being 1/1440 of an inch.

This seems more complicated than decimal pair to me, because you 
need to recompute from twips to actual pixels, so you need to know 
screen resolution and size.

Geomol, don't forget you can just use a higher resolution and scale 
it.

That's the way how the twips works 1px = 20twips so 1.2px = 24twips 
- the scaling is done on the draw engine side so you don't need to 
scale it yourself. In my dialect i just have directive 'units twips' 
and then the interpreter know that 24x24 is equal to 1.2x.1.2  --- 
if I'm not using twips all values are multiplied by 20 and rounded 
- that's the way how it's in Flash and in my Rebol/Flash dialect

OK, so that would be more comfortable and handy.

The EFFECT block is like a graphical pipeline. You can have a serie 
of effects and DRAW blocks after each other. Like:

img: to-image layout [box red "Red" box green "Green" box blue "Blue"]

view layout [box 200x400 white effect [draw [image img] tint 40 draw 
[translate 100x100 image img]]]

Gemol .... that is interesting (I understand now what is meant by 
a a graphical pipeline) but not quite what I wanted. 

I have a draw block with a number of images and I want to apply an 
effect indivdual images.

Small, yet very nice! Clear and cool, reminds me on e.g. the buttons 
of my old tape deck. I think you've already said it before: the BTN 
style's look is nice, but it's way too under-represented in VID, 
making typical layouts look inconsistend. This one helps.

now I've run into the problem with VID elements sharing the same 
font object, which means that if I create three tab views, and change 
the font in the first one, the other two incorrectly also change. 
where exactly is this fixed? I've tried putting the font object inside 
the init code for the element, but this makes it impossible to change 
the font settings from within the layout.

I hit that problem with shared para object and the fix was:

stylize/master [
	area: area with [insert tail init [para: make para []]]
]

so something similiar for font should work.

If it's the LAYOUT user who want's different fonts, let him specify 
them.

If it''s you wanting to to have e.g. a second bold font just for 
the pressed tab in one tab-view, I think you may for example allocate 
two font objects and dynamically swap them in the FEEL/REDRAW.
Code fragment:


 redraw: func [face action offset] [... face/font: pick face/fonts 
 face/state ...]

You may even get along with changing a single font object:


 redraw: func [face action offset] [... face/font/style: if face/state 
 ['bold] ...]

now it's a chicken and egg thing. If I clone the object inside INIT, 
the font settings inside the layout is ignored, apparently because 
they are parsed before INIT is run.

On Gabriele's note, use FLAG-FACE? to check for flags:

	>> layout [b: box]
	>> flag-face? b font
	== none
	>> layout [b: box font-size 30]
	>> flag-face? b font
	== [font]

and FLAG-FACE when you want to set a flag yourself.

Strangely, I don't recall ever having to use this technique in my 
styles, and I'm sure I dealt with these issues.

(catching an error if the call is not licenced)...  obviously this 
works, but its not very nice and it would be cool to be able to list 
available /pro features.

and we aren't talking of other obscure packages like dll, link, sdk... 
for which I have no clue what is enabled.

I tried to create with the following code a circle with a transparent 
background and save it. I tried some different versions, but currently 
I have no glue how to achieve this. The point is I need a file with 
a circle and a transparent background :-) and I thought I quickly 
do this with Rebol instead of using a paintprogram. So am I doing 
something wrong ? It's saving the background from the window and 
if that is set to 'none then it's black ?

view layout [
    b: box 22x22 effect [
        draw [pen red line-width 2 circle 11x11 10]
    ]
    across 
    f: field 200 button "Save" [
        file-name: to-file f/text

        unless find/last file-name ".png" [append file-name ".png"]
        save/png file-name to-image b
    ]
]

There is some rebol-XXX? words and one is 'rebol-pro?
>> help rebol-
Found these words:
   rebol-command?  logic!    false
   rebol-encap?    logic!    false
   rebol-link?     logic!    false
   rebol-pro?      logic!    false
   rebol-view?     logic!    true
   to-rebol-file   native!   Converts a local

It always happens during events with the mouse.. like drag and drop 
up/down while dragging out of the window etc..

Maybe you use custom faces not based on 'VID-face but on 'face object, 
so there is some "properties" missing in your faces.


This code is from the global event handler and handle field/area 
loose of focus :

	 probe system/view/screen-face/feel/event-funcs

Well strangly enough it doesnt always happen.. i was testing from 
this document -> http://www.rebol.com/docs/view-system.htmland example 
10.4 Iteration Example

 does crash.. probably an minor error somewhere... did not check it..

Well now you mentioned it.. I had a look and its stuffed with 'Steel 
configurations.. Let me remove those ;-)

Im using Layout where im appending panes into layouts.. But i dont 
think thats the problem... The problem is resizing an 'effect to 
negative numbers... like a box from 0x0 500x500 to ->  -50x0 -100x100 
...and only using it in the Engage event... Odd?? anyone an explanation 
perhaps ? This is Linux /rebview from SDk262

I would really like to see that roadmap .... and discuss it here 
- what waits for the new branch, and what goes into 2.x .... VID 
is still incomplete and misses some show-stopper styles like grouping, 
tabs, drop-down is ugly like hell

Yes "roadmap"... We are all very currious regarding a roapmap and 
status indicator of all the running projects.. I have asked Carl 
if it would be possible to publish sush an indicator for the public.. 
It seemed a good idea to him...so lets wait and see if that can bring 
us more insight ;-)

don't be so inpatient. as Carl said on 3rd March and Gabriele on 
14th March, roadmap is just couple of days away.

Question regarding 'draw and 'face..

What is adviced .. Im currently creating faces what will later be 
stored as pictures i.e. PNG.. 

No should I start already using an IMAGE and draw on that or create 
faces and draw on that?


Im not sure what is more efficient in relation to flexibilty of creating 
images regarding delete and create of faces inside faces or creating 
/ deleting images from/inside images..

coming back to the question.. In both cases of my program the output 
will always be an image.. so should I start drawing already on an 
image of should i use faces and convert those to an image?

oke a small extraction of it... You draw something.. I.e. you draw 
a circle.. (I know do that with a face and a 'draw effect) but when 
i look at the Paint-Program from the Old Draw manual its done directly 
on an image.. That Circle can grow in size and shrink in size or 
even be deleted..can change color... can have overlaps.. anctualy 
think of it as a drawing too with interactive drawings.. (Though 
the output is always an image because the result is saved as an image...No 
framework is saved in rebol code..)

Well, if you want to keep a long DRAW block, you can modify the parameters 
and change/delete commands. Every time the face is refreshed, however, 
that draw block will be executed. This will become slow eventually. 
So once in a while you will want to render the result into an image 
and clear the draw block. This is as simple as  face/image: to-image 
face .

yes and keep a block to the draw which created it so you can play 
with it later, if you want  (undo, history, etc).

yes thats what I though... but somehow I need to be able to stick 
the colors and the alpha together and that brings me always to a 
string.. instead of a tuple.. so the result is 'none and thus my 
drawing is transparent ;-)

Duh? i tried that already... But I see now... i mixed a .64 and a 
"." 64 with the rejoin.. This would indeed ben very odd if that would 
not have been possible ;-) Thnx...

Q: invalid args: []

Hi, I have a layout, and I always get the above mentioned error ... 
does anyone know a some hints to find the culprit? I haven't succeeded 
so far.

Q: Clickable list lines

Hi, I have a 'list with several 'texts in it, Now I want to be able 
to click anywhere on a line, and start some action. So far I add 
an action block to the text fields. Is it possible to add it to the 
list itself, so that it is available anywhere on the line, even when 
there's no text field?

Is someone able to point me to a document on the design principles 
of VIEW's modal window system which has kept up with the latest changes 
and corrections made by IIRC Romano and Gabrielle? I only located 
snatches on the web but found no official or semi-official docs.

Should have read "design goals" rather than "principles". It's the 
idea I'm looking for, and even the SDK sources are very terse wrt 
this subject.

3) this feel decides if the event should be eaten, the popup should 
be closed, and so on

4.1) the default one, blocks all the other events, and hides the 
popup on close

4.3) the "away" one closes the popup on any event (except move, time, 
active and inactive) outside of it

4.4) the "away-nobtn" one is a combination of 2 and 3

4.5) the "win" one is for popups inside another window (as a subface), 
and has a different logic to figure out if the event is "outside" 
or "inside" it; it also does not hide the popup on close

4.6) "win-nobtn" combines 2 and 5

4.7) "win-away" combines 3 and 5 (e.g. popups for CHOOSE and so on)

4.8) "win-away-nobtn" combines 2, 3 and 5

Concise, clean and straight  to the point, Gabriele. It's information 
like this I expected to get through commented source code when I 
once bought the SDK. Invaluable information - it's fairly easy to 
see what code is doing, but hard to understand what code want's to 
accomplish. Thanks!

How do most people handle drag and drop events so that the drag face 
doesn't go beyond the borders of the parent face?

I was thinking about this last night and a good modification to the 
face object might be good to include the item 'move-limit

I'm not trying to do anything actually - I actually do it from within 
the feel as well.  I agree that I don't want REBOL to bloat anymore 
than necessary.  I think this could be something that could be added 
to VID for example.  I think VID could even be pulled out of the 
system object and just loaded when needed.

They seem to be removed (at least from global context) in View 1.3.1 
(or maybe before). Previous betas had these (eg. View 1.2.7):
>> ? reg
Found these words:

   create-reg      native!   Creates a registry key and returns TRUE 
   on success...

   delete-reg      native!   Deletes a registry key. Returns TRUE if 
   deleted. (...

   exists-reg?     native!   Returns TRUE if registry key exists. (HKCU 
   is defa...

   get-reg         native!   Returns value of a registry key, else NONE. 
   (HKCU ...

   list-reg        native!   Returns a block of sub-keys for a registry 
   key. (H...

   set-reg         native!   Sets registry key value. Returns value 
   on success,...
   unset-reg-funcs function! [

and it worked like this:
>> get-reg/hkcu "Software\Rebol\View" "Home"
== "d:\anton\dev\rebol\view"

The problem I have is, that I start a reblet from inside IOS but 
it needs the new View. So I cechk this and want to start View automatically. 
For this I need the install location, dynamically at runtime.

Using...what is it...RUN from IOS should run the associated app. 
So, assuming they set up a .r association, you could run a test .r 
script and look at system/options/boot.

The only way I can see is to create the word that holds the font 
dynamically, and use reduce to insert the new word into the draw 
block.

I think the 'textinfo function is used for that (used in ctx-text/text-edit). 
But we have no infos on how to use it and what it does exactly.

I've got a column of text about 40 chars, and I want it to snake 
up and down 3 columns on a page .. and it seems to work.

A pity I can't pick up a draw object and move it around on screen 
:(

layering VID faces on top of the DRAW sheet and drag them around

how does your program work? is it a dialect that can produce DRAW 
and PS?

I'm less concerned about scaling and rotations as I really only need 
text and lines/boxes.

And you ?

well, I need some scaling and 90 degree rotation. I'm creating the 
number marks you use in a marathon race to put on your chest and 
back.

You've already seen my psd2draw.r script .. I just feed the same 
block thru my ps dialect to get the postsrcript and write that to 
a file.

are John's and my ps dialects that disimilar ?

mac and windows

and it has to be working perfectly no later than tuesday...

my natek on the situation - View is about to be rewritten. And it 
is here to stay for good imo. Well, we may not be in Flash league 
as for speedy and smooth presentations, but I still can't somehow 
find so integrated toolkit as View is.  If I need small encapped 
app, there is not option, but View ...

I asked my friend about Ruby, Python - as my idea was, that corporations 
should throw out tools like Delphi, VB .... .NET and JAVA are goliath 
... but he told me, that Python has to bind to other gui toolkits 
and that it is not so integrated .... he then mentioned AJAX, killing 
all needs for anything like View ... but - just go and find some 
statistics ... look at W3C and look for the state of support for 
all that MLs in recent browsers - you will find situation quite messy 
...

Give me one thing - decent keyboard support, add tree-view, better 
grid to Rebgui, redesign widgets to visually support in-focus state, 
and you are done! Then go and look at your "app" source - very nice 
dialect - you will NOT find anything like that anywhere. Very nice 
and readable code. The problem is, VID stopped 80% on its way to 
success - the rest, those missing 20% ruined it.

now there is new attempt - DOM3 specs, to provide e.g. even hooks 
for your web apps .... when it will be actually developed and supported 
by most browsers? Dunno .... View still has some chance, especially 
in the browser - plug-in .....