LabWindows/CVI Idea Exchange

Hello,

building upon my earlier (but difficult to implement) suggestion and the forum discussion on event data here I can provide a hopefully improved suggestion.

The issues addressed by this idea:

• receiving an EVENT_DATA_CHANGED event for a numeric control does not mean that the numeric value has changed
• receiving an EVENT_DATA_CHANGED event for a numeric control does not provide information if the value has been increased or decreased
• receiving an EVENT_DATA_CHANGED event for a numeric control does not provide information if the 'up' or 'down' arrow button has been pressed (which is not necessarily the same as the second issue)

Idea: Provide eventData1 and eventData2 information.

For example, eventData1 could tell about the numeric value:

• eventData1 = -1: numeric value has been decreased
• eventData1 = 0: numeric value is unchanged
• eventData1 = 1: numeric value has been increased

eventData2 could tell about the increment/decrement arrow, e.g.:

• eventData2 = -1: decrement arrow has been pressed by mouse
• eventData2 = -2: decrement arrow has been pressed on keyboard
• eventData2= 1: increment arrow has been pressed by mouse
• eventData2= 2: increment arrow has been pressed on keyboard

Since so far no eventdata are provided this suggestion should not break backward compatibility.

I am happy to see that the suggestion of integrating the tooltips into the UI editor was successful. Now I would like to see better, more powerful tooltips

In particular, I suggest

• adding another tooltip attribute allowing the tooltip to disappear automatically after a given time (default of say 3-5 seconds); hence the tooltip would show up with the tooltip delay, show for this specified appearance time, and then disappear automatically. I think that this is the most frequently encountered behavior in other programs. Setting this attribute value to 0 or -1 would imply "show infinitely long"
• adding an attribute TOOLTIPS_WIDTH that would allow for automatic linebreaks, similar to the behavior found in textboxes. Right now, tooltips get infinitely long if no line breaks are inserted manually. Linebreaks, however, depend on font size etc... The width should be specified in pixels (possibly with a default of say 400)
• adding an attribute TOOLTIPS_WRAP_MODE, specifying the wrap mode (character/word/...) as in textboxes
• the possibility of simple text formatting, such as bold or italics. For illustration have a look at the CVI UI editor control panel, e.g. of a text box. Click on the question mark in the upper right corner of the window and then on e.g. line mode: This shows a nice example of what I would like to have to better explain different options (of say a ring control) in a clear way
• additional tooltips for column headers, row headers, even for every cell of a table: Tooltips of a complete table control may not always be useful, while I have several scenarios in mind where these added tooltips would be most useful: - explain the table columns: typically, due to space constraints, table headers are pretty brief and so extra information could be provided via tooltips for each individual column header. - if a table gets larger and is scrolled, table headers disappear: One could use tooltips (per column) to remind the user what he is actually seeing in column 17...

Thanks

It seems that one cannot cut/copy/paste menu items between multiple menubars.  If I copy an item in one menu bar, exit the 'Edit Menu Bar' dialog, then open the 'Edit Menu Bar' dialog for another menubar the paste buttons are dimmed.  It would handy at times to be able to do this.  Thanks.