Description of the enhanced FBox.pm module

This change affects the getOpenFile and getSaveFile methods of the Perl/Tk toolkit on Linux, which are used to pop up a dialog box to select a file to open or save, respectively the underlying FBox.pm module.

Property showhidden

The enhanced FBox.pm module provides a new property named showhidden that enables or disables the listing of hidden items by setting it's value to 'on' or 'off':
 

$File = $w->getOpenFile(-title => "Sample Window", -showhidden => 'off');

If the showhidden property is omitted, the FBox.pm works in the usual way, which means, that you can still use all your programs as they are, after you installed the enhanced FBox.pm module.

Perl/Tk FBox.pm filled with hidden items (some 50 items in front of the other ones)

Perl/Tk FBox.pm without hidden items

Property msgfont

Perl/Tk FBox.pm with legacy feedback dialog

The enhanced FBox.pm module provides a new property named msgfont that you can use to set the font for feedbacks, just like this:
 

$File = $w->getSaveFile(-title => "Sample Window", -msgfont => '{My FontName} 10 bold');

If the msgfont property is omitted, feedback works with no font specified (i.e. the message shows up with 'some' font), which means, that you can still use all your programs as they are, after you installed the enhanced FBox.pm module.

Perl/Tk FBox.pm with enhanced feedback dialog, 1st sample



Perl/Tk FBox.pm with enhanced feedback dialog, 2nd sample



Perl/Tk FBox.pm with enhanced feedback dialog, 3rd sample

Create the enhanced FBox.pm module

• Locate the ConfigSpecs method within the sub Populate and insert the new properties like this:
  
  

  $w->ConfigSpecs(-defaultextension => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, undef],
              -filetypes          => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, undef],
              -initialdir         => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, undef],
              -initialfile        => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, undef],
#             -sortcmd            => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, sub { lc($a) cmp lc($b) }],
              -sortcmd            => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, sub { lc($_[0]) cmp lc($_[1]) }],
              -title              => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, undef],
              -type               => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, 'open'],
              -filter             => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, '*'],
              -force              => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, 0],
              -multiple           => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, 0],
              -msgfont            => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, 0],
              -showhidden         => ['PASSIVE', undef, undef, 0],
              'DEFAULT'           => [$icons],
              );


  
  
  
• Use your editor's Search Feature to find every call of the messageBox method and insert the new property into the messageBox method call:
  
  

  my $reply = $w->messageBox
  (-icon => 'warning',
  -font => $msgfont,
  -type => 'YesNo',
  -message => "File \"$selectFilePath\" already exists.\nDo you want to overwrite it?");
return unless (lc($reply) eq 'yes');


  
  
  
• Take care that every subroutine using the messageBox method gets it's local variable for the msgfont property by inserting the according code line like this:
  
  

  sub Done {
    my $w = shift;
    my $msgfont = $w->cget(-msgfont);
.
.
.


  
  
  
• Use your editor's Search Feature to find the comment line# Make the dir & file list within the sub Update and there first create a local variable for the showhidden property and then add the evaluation code as shown in the following code snippet:
  
  

      # Make the dir & file list
    my $cwd = _cwd();
    my $showhidden = $w->cget(-showhidden);
    local *FDIR;
    if (opendir(FDIR, $cwd)) {
        my @files;
        my $sortcmd = sub { $w->cget(-sortcmd)->($a,$b) };
        my $flt = $w->cget(-filter);
        my $fltcb;
        if (ref $flt eq 'CODE') {
            $fltcb = $flt;
    } else {
            $flt = _rx_to_glob($flt);
        }
        my $type_dir = $w->cget(-type) eq 'dir';
        foreach my $f (sort $sortcmd readdir(FDIR)) {
            next if $f eq '.' or $f eq '..';
            #
            # Evaluate showhidden property:
            if ($showhidden eq 'off'){
              next if substr($f, 0, 1) eq '.';
            }
    .
    .
    .


Install the enhanced FBox.pm module

WARNING:
While this file replacement may work in a similar way on other platforms too, you could encounter trouble with the implementation. While the code for the msgfont property will run as is, the one for the showhidden property is os-dependent (For Windows the use of an additional module is needed). Moreover on Windows 2000 and ActiveState Perl v5.8.8, Perl/Tk version 804.027 for example, you can run a program with a changed FBox.pm module as long, as you use legacy calls with getOpenFile resp. getSaveFile. If you incorporate the new properties in the method call you'll end up with a 'bad option' error. There seems to be a controlling mechanism concerning the options which I didn't yet understand, maybe the option database is the right suspect... Unfortunately this is a rather tricky thing, and since I am barely using Windows this will take it's time...

Home  ---   Description  ---   Create  ---   Install  ---   Download for Perl/Tk Version 804.028 on Linux

Copyright © by Andreas-Josef v. Gencsy 2008

AjvG is programmer of

vGShop the managed Online Shop System