Selecting a Skin to Use at Run Time

The Skin Selection dialog enables users of runtime applications to select the skin that they want to use during the current runtime work session. For details about enabling runtime users to define or maintain JADE skins that you have provided, see "Defining and Maintaining JADE Skins". The following example shows the creation and use of the JadeSkinSelect form from a click event method in user application logic.

selectSkin_click(menuItem: MenuItem input) updating;
vars
    form : JadeSkinSelect;
begin
    create form;
    form.showModal;
epilog
    delete form;
end;

When using the Skin Selection dialog:

• The form is displayed using the requested skin.

• The option buttons, check boxes, and buttons display the skin presentations.

• The Show Menu? check box enables users to view the effects of a skin with and without a menu.

• The Apply button causes that skin to be applied to the forms of the current application.

• The Clear Skin button removes the use of a skin from the current application.

  The Cancel button leaves the skin usage unchanged.

• Programmatically, if the user:

  • Selects a skin, modalResult = JadeSkinSelect.Skin_Chosen(1) and the userObject property contains the selected skin.

  • Clicks the Cancel button, modalResult = JadeSkinSelect.Skin_Cancel(0).

  • Clicks the Clear Skin button, modalResult = JadeSkinSelect.Skin_Cleared(2).

Use the app.getSkinCollection method to obtain the collection of skins and display a list of the names of each skin object if you want to implement your own selection scheme in your applications. Your user application needs only to create and modally show this form, shown in the following image.

To select a skin for use in the current work session

1. Select the skin from the list that is displayed in the Select Skin combo box. The option buttons, check boxes, and buttons then display the presentation offered by the selected skin.

2. Click the Show Menu? check box to view the effects of a skin without a menu. By default, a check mark symbol (✓) is displayed in this control, indicating that the menu line is displayed on the Skin Selection dialog.

3. To apply the selected skin to all forms in the current application during the current work session, click the Apply button. Alternatively, perform one of the following actions.

   • Click the Clear Skin button to remove the use of a skin from the current application.

   • Click the Cancel button to abandon your selections and leave the skin usage unchanged.

The following image shows an example of the Skin Selection dialog using a skin.

The JADE executable calls the DisableProcessWindowsGhosting() Microsoft API on initiation, which disables Windows’ ghosting so that a non-responsive form does not show Not Responding and have the ghosting effect applied by Windows.

The form will still not automatically paint itself when the presentation thread is busy processing JADE logic. Windows automatically redraws that part of the form or forms that need refreshing from a saved copy of the previously painted image or images.

You can call the following methods while performing a long processing loop to address the repainting issue.

• Application ::paintIfRequired;

  The Application class paintIfRequired method causes all forms of the application to be repainted if a paint is required. A refreshNow event is performed on that part of the form that needed refreshing. If paint events are not required, no action is performed. This method performs any repainting required without having to perform an app.doWindowEvents method call, and therefore does not allow the user interface to be active.

  Other than any paint events, no other events, notifications, or timer events will be processed as a result of this paintIfRequired method call.

• Form ::paintIfRequired;

  The Form class paintIfRequired method performs the same action as the Application class paintIfRequired method except that only the form on which the call is made will be affected.

After a repaint, any clicked button that initiated the processing loop will be drawn in the up position, so it will be important that the user is given a visual indication that the processing is still progressing by some other means; for example, using the app.mousePointer := 11 (busy) property value.

You will need to add a call to your logic loop that is regularly performed; for example, call it when the Cancel button is checked for a click event, when a progress bar update ticks over a percentage, or at a specified number of seconds, as shown in the following code fragment.

cancelled := false;
    while not cancelled do
        .... logic
    // the click event sets the cancelled property
    btnCancel.doWindowEvents(0);
    app.paintIfRequired();
endwhile;