08302-0356 Larry RizzoCEO577 Burlington RoadP.O. Box 458 Help
@Ä Custom button sizes ;6In case I'm not the only one out there who didn't know
this… 94Did you know that you can change the size of buttons 72using the Font size commands in the layout editor? :5In one of my many calls to ACIUS tech support someone 94mentioned to me in passing that I could control the =8height of buttons by selecting the button and then using the Font size menu items.
=8I can't remember who passed that tip on to me, but I was *%very happy to learn about it. Thanks. '$New Features in version 1.1 of Help! =8Version 1.1 of Help! has several important new features. >91. Print button in the help topics dialog allows the user 0+to print help topics and their detail text. =82. Find button in the help topics dialog allows the user ?:to find all of the help topics containing a search string. 943. I incorporated Dave Terry's Add/Ins/Del subrecord ;6code from the samples data base example. This makes it
94much easier to edit the help detail text. I made two @;additions to the routine. In the before portion of the code :5for the TopicIn layout procedure I calculate sequence :5numbers for subrecords that were entered before this ;6procedure was added. This way you can add this feature *%to systems you already have in place. =8In the after portion of the routine I make sure that the <7subrecords are saved in sequence number order. This way <7I don't have to sort them when I want to load them for display. It saves time. Thanks Dave! @;4. I changed the font size of the topics scrollable area to ?:12 point instead of 10. I prefer this. I didn't delete the >9original layout though, so if you prefer the smaller type =8just swap the names of the layouts in the layout dialog. >9In addition to adding these features I've corrected a few 83bugs that were bothering me and generally tried to (#clean up the procedures throughout.
Thanks! @;I just wanted to put in a note of appreciation to the folks ?:at ACIUS for all of the help that I have received over the last few months. ;6Very few software companies stand by their product the ! way you folks do. Thank you! Keep it short ?:As you have probably noticed, if the detail part of a help ?:entry is long it takes a little while to load this array. 83I would suggest keeping your entries as short as is >9possible while still providing the help that is required. Exiting Modify Selection =8As much as I like Modify Selection, I've never liked the =8fact that the user must click on a button to escape from =8that mode. You'll find that the Modify Selection that is ;6invoked by the menu command "Enter Help Topics..." has =8been set up so that the user may select an item from the >9Menubar and it will be executed. This eliminates the step ?:of clicking on a button first to signal that you are done with modify selection. >9This is done by including a short output layout procedure
<7in any of the output layouts called by the global fMod. <7This output layout procedure uses an external procedure ?:to cancel the Modify Selection. Then the global fMod calls 4/another global called HandleMenu which runs the appropriate procedure. Function type procedures @;One of the other goodies you'll find in this template is a ?:global procedure that I call "fMod". This procedure can be ;6used to do a Modify Selection on any file in your data ;6base. It quickly gives you many of the features of the % User environment in Custom mode. :5It can easily be extended by adding extra buttons and code segments to match. 72This procedure makes extensive use of the EXECUTE
94command. It is worth studying if you're not familiar with that command already. :5To use this procedure you'll need to create an Output =8Layout with the following buttons in the footer section: Accept buttons bNew bPrint bDelete bSearch bSort bAll Don't Accept button bDone @;You'll also need to create a global procedure for each file 0+that passes the parameters to the function. *%It should be in the following format: <7fMod("FileName";"SortFieldName";"InLayout";"OutLayout") External procedures <7This version of Help! uses external procedures provided by Todd Carper of ACIUS. 94You'll find the externals in two places. I used the 83ValidateDlg external in the layout procedure of the 72Topics dialog, and the CancelEntry external in the &!output layout procedure TopicOut. (%How to use Help! in your applications <7How to use Help! in your own 4D applications depends on :5whether or not you have created your application yet. ?:If you have created your application then you will have to =8create the same file structure in your data base that I >9have included in this example. Then you will have to copy :5each of the layouts and procedures from this template 72into your own application. Not a pleasant thought. <7If you are starting a new project then I would suggest
>9that you clone this template using 4D Tools. Then use the =8cloned data base as the foundation for your new project. <7In either case you will have to make a copy of the file 61Proc.Ext and place it in the folder with your new 72project. 4D Tools does not copy the Proc.Ext file. Customers
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