[comp.sys.apple] System Disk 3.2 menu caching

AWCTTYPA@UIAMVS.BITNET ("David A. Lyons") (09/03/88)

>Date:         Thu, 1 Sep 88 11:11:00 EDT
>From:         TMPLee@DOCKMASTER.ARPA
>Subject:      Re: System Disk 3.2

>[...]does the menu acceleration (caching) only work with Apple's
>menus (e.g., in the Finder) or does it also work with other
>applications that use the Toolbox?

It will work automatically with any STANDARD (meaning basically
text-based) menus in all programs that use the IIgs Menu Manager.
Things like menus full of COLORS or menus with other illustrations
in them are CUSTOM menus and require the programmer to make small
changes in the program before the menus can be cached.  (This is
because the menu manager wouldn't know when the cached image became
invalid.)

>[In] WordPerfect (2.1 beta)[...] the menus used to be drawn from top
>to bottom, but now that they are also using "pop out" as well as
>"pull down" menus they for some reason have to be drawn bottom to
>top, which, believe it or not at least psychologically slows things
>down noticeably since you have to wait for the whole menu is drawn
>before you can slide the mouse down to the item you want; when they
>are drawn top to bottom you can start sliding the mouse down as fast
>as your hand will go.

I think this is what's going on:  When a menu is drawn quickly from
its cached image, it's done from bottom to top.  When no cached
image is available, it's drawn the old way from top to bottom (in
the case of non-custom menus, ones that don't have color boxes or
other non-text stuff).  The menus have to be pretty tall before you
can tell which direction the cached image is drawn from--otherwise
it usually appears during the same scan of the screen, since it
takes much less than 1/60 second.

I'm curious on the part about it being/seeming slower--I haven't
noticed it.  In both cases you won't be able to get any items to
hilite until the drawing it done.  I *think* you can move the mouse
while the cached image is being drawn, but even if you can't it
should catch up with you promptly when the drawing is finished.

>TMPLee@Dockmaster.ARPA

--David A. Lyons              bitnet: awcttypa@uiamvs
  DAL Systems                 CompuServe:  72177,3233
  P.O. Box 287                GEnie mail:    D.LYONS2
  North Liberty, IA 52317     AppleLinkPE: Dave Lyons