cbmbsw@amiga.UUCP (Mail to BSW) (03/06/86)
Hello, folks. Today, I've got a very cool thing for you!
Many developers (including myself) have wished for a
RefreshWindowFrame() Intuition function, which
function would redraw the entire window frame on
demand. The window frame refers to the window border,
window title, and all window gadgets (both the system
gadgets and your own). The function would be especially
handy when you have done something to your window
which could wipe out the systemy stuff. Have you
ever wished that you could call some magic Intuition
incantation to have the whole thing refreshed for you?
Frustrated when you found that this ability seemed to
be beyond your grasp? Well, guess what ... you already
have such a function available to you, but you just didn't
know it. I didn't know it until just yesterday.
Follow me as I lead you into some of the darker recesses
of Intuition ...
A little recognized but very real idiosyncracy of the
SetWindowTitles() function is that it does in fact cause
the entire window frame to be redrawn. Therefore,
you can honestly use this function as a pseudo window
redraw function. You need only make a define in your
include file like this:
#define RefreshWindowFrame(w) SetWindowTitles(w,w->Title,-1)
Then you are free to use the RefreshWindowFrame() call as
you would any other Intuition call. The argument to the
RefreshWindowFrame function is a pointer to a window structure,
which structure is returned to you by a call to OpenWindow().
struct Window *window;
window = OpenWindow(...);
RefreshWindowFrame(window);
And that's it! Hope you enjoyed this programmer's tool,
brought to you by the meek, humble, and distant
=RJ Mical=
Director of Intuition
[PS: this will work with the 1.1 release of Intuition. The
mythical forthcoming 1.2 release of the system may not support
this shortcut, unless the powers that be (Oh great and
powerful and wonderful and handsome and strong Jim Mackraz,
are you listening?) leave SetWindowTitles() as is. The cost would
be that that SetWindowTitles() will *always* redraw the entire
window frame, whether or not its necessary. The benefit is
that programmers get a RefreshWindowFrame() function *today*,
with the 1.1 release of the system. Cost too much for this
great benefit? I don't think so. You decide. But be forewarned
that until Mackraz (current Intuition guru) blesses this, it
may not work with the 1.2 release, although if enough people
start to use this "undocumented feature" of Intuition it will
de facto become a documented feature. Or is that treason?]aglew@ccvaxa.UUCP (03/10/86)
I just love that title: =RJ Mical= Director of Intuition Is there a director of Common Sense, or a manager of Non-Obvious But True Facts?