AmigActive 6/AACD06.ISO/AACD/Utilities/MUIbase/FAQ

Text File | 1998-05-16 | 6KB | 144 lines

FREQUENLY ASKED QUESTIONS
=========================

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Q: How can I use Cygnus Ed as external editor?
   (External editor)
A: Using CygnusEd as external editor is not easy:  Inserting "ced %f"
   in the requester is not enough, because CED needs a stack of 8000
   bytes.  CED also detaches itself from MUIbase, so MUIbase cannot
   wait for the quit of CED.  A solution is writing a script like
   this:
       .key file
       .bra {
       .ket }
       ; calls CED for MUIbase
       ; ---------------------

       stack 8192
       CED {file} "-pubscreen=MUIbase_PubScreen" -keepio
   Note that I use
       MUIbase_PubScreen
   as screen for MUIbase. If you use Workbench, so use
       -pubscreen=Workbench
   for that purpose. Save this script as
       MUIBASE:CallCED
   and type in the external editor field
       MUIBASE:CallCED %f.

(Ralph Reuchlein [[e-mail]], 18.06.1996)
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Q: Why you are using (CONCAT2 "" ...)?
   (String programming)
A: In the beginning of programming MUIbase, I used
       (CONCAT2 "" strings ...)
   to concatenate strings.  Steffen told me that I have to engage my
   brain and he asked me why I didn't use
       (+ strings ...)
   instead of above one. :-)

(Ralph Reuchlein [[e-mail]], 15.04.1997)
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Q: How can I make a conditional expression like C?
   (C-like programming)
A: To use e.g.
       s=(t)?("1"):("0");
   from C in MUIbase, you simply have to use
       (SETQ s (IF t "1" "0"))
   to get the same result.

(Ralph Reuchlein [[e-mail]], 15.04.1997)
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Q: Is there a way to use CygnusEd without using a script?
   (External editor)
A: A short solution for the CED problem is typing this one into the
   external editor requester:
       stack 8192<CTRL J>CED -keepio %f
   The <CTRL J> is the shortcut for Line Feed (do not type the
   characters as shown [:-)] ).  This is only possible, if you turned
   off the item "Text gadget filter" in the "IControl preferences".

(Allan Odgaard [[e-mail]], 15.08.1997)
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Q: How to implement AmigaBase's LOADMEMO?
   (AmigaBase equals)
A: To use the "LOADMEMO" function from AmigaBase in MUIbase, you
   simply have to use this self defined function:
       (DEFUN loadMEMO (filename:STR)
         (LET ((file:FILE (FOPEN filename "r")) memo:MEMO)
           (SETQ memo (FGETMEMO file))
           (FCLOSE file)
           memo
         )
       )
   You might wonder, what will happen, if "(FOPEN)" fails?  Then the
   variable "file" will hold "NIL".  "(FGETMEMO file)" is evaluated to
   "(FGETMEMO NIL)" and returns also "NIL" and finally the complete
   function returns "NIL".

(Steffen Gutmann [[e-mail]], 28.08.1997)
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Q: How to make colorized text in MUIbase text objects?
   (GUI related)
A: To specify colors in objects like "button" or "text", you simply
   have to insert a escape sequence.  The sequence has the format
       <ESC>n
   where "<ESC>" is the escape character and "n" is the number of the
   pen.  "n" can be used in the range from 0 and 9.  In my MUI
   environment, colors 0, 2, 4, 6 and 9 are the text pen; color 1, 3
   and 8 are the highlight pen; color 5 is the fill pen and finally
   color 7 is the background pen.  As you can see you only have 4
   colors!
   You are right if you say that after pressing <ESC> the window
   closes.  Therefore you can use the copy'n'paste feature of the
   string gadgets (if according MUI library exists) as well as the
   simple keyboard shortcut <CTRL [> to write the <ESC> character into
   the string gadget.

   Avoid using color sequences in Window buttons, because the window
   titlebar does not replace the escape sequences and you would see
   the sequence as is!
   Due to the limited number of colors (only 4) in future there will
   not be a direct support for colorized text in MUIbase.  So you can
   use this sequences.

(Ralph Reuchlein [[e-mail]], 29.01.1998)
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Q: How to make styled text in MUIbase text objects?
   (GUI related)
A: To specify styles in objects like "button" or "text", you simply
   have to insert a escape sequence.  The sequence has the format
       <ESC>x
   where "<ESC>" is the escape character and "x" is one of the
   following characters:
       n     normal style
       b     bold style
       i     italic style
       u     underlined style

   You are right if you say that after pressing <ESC> the window
   closes.  Therefore you can use the copy'n'paste feature of the
   string gadgets (if according MUI library exists) as well as the
   simple keyboard shortcut <CTRL [> to write the <ESC> character into
   the string gadget.

   Avoid using style sequences in Window buttons, because the window
   titlebar does not replace the escape sequences and you would see
   the sequence as is!

(Ralph Reuchlein [[e-mail]], 29.01.1998)
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Q: Is there a way to have more flexible choice attributes?
   (Choice attributes)
A: Yes, use a string attribute, set its display object to read-only
   and attach a listview to it.  Now the user can't directly enter a
   string by hand but select an item from the popup listview.  The
   difference to a choice attribute is that you can still change the
   order of labels and the label strings itself, as in this case real
   strings rather than internal numbers are stored in the records.
   There are also two programming functions for getting and setting
   the labels:  (GETLABELS <attr>) and (SETLABELS <attr> <string>).

(Steffen Gutmann [[e-mail]], 02.03.1998)
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