lrasmuss@nmsu.edu (Linda Rasmussen) (02/14/90)
Does anyone know of an easy way to create UP and NEXT buttons in a very large
hierarchical stack? It looks something like this:
a a a
b b b b b b
c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c
There are at least a hundred "a" cards; what we need is for UP arrow
buttons to go up to the parent "b" if they are a "c", or up to the
parent "a" if they are a "b". We also need the NEXT arrows to go to
the next "a" if they are on an "a" card, the next "b" if they are on a
"b" card, etc. Obviously this can't be done with background arrows!
...But it is rather time consuming to have to script the up and
next arrows on EVERY card.
Has anyone ever had to do this? Did you come up with any brilliant
shortcuts?
Thanks for any suggestions!
Linda Rasmussen lrasmuss@nmsu.edu
New Mexico State University (505)646-5598SAS102@psuvm.psu.edu (Steven A. Schrader) (02/14/90)
In article <529@opus.NMSU.EDU>, lrasmuss@nmsu.edu (Linda Rasmussen) says: > >Does anyone know of an easy way to create UP and NEXT buttons in a very large >hierarchical stack? It looks something like this: > > a a a > b b b b b b > c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c > You could set a variable called LastCard. When you leave the parent card, you "Put the id of this card into LastCard" then on the up arrow you "Go cd id LastCard" The down buttons would have to be scripted though ... ------- Steven A. Schrader (SAS102@Psuvm SAS@Psuarch) _________________________________________________________________________ 227C Computer Building The Pennsylvania State University University Park, Pa. 16802 Phone : (814) 865 - 2160 343 Strouse Ave. State College, Pa. 16803 (814) 237 - 8196
jtw@wuee1.wustl.edu (Trent Wohlschlaeger) (02/15/90)
In article <529@opus.NMSU.EDU> lrasmuss@nmsu.edu (Linda Rasmussen) writes: > >Does anyone know of an easy way to create UP and NEXT buttons in a very large >hierarchical stack? It looks something like this: > > a a a > b b b b b b > c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c > >There are at least a hundred "a" cards; what we need is for UP arrow >buttons to go up to the parent "b" if they are a "c", or up to the I did this a while ago. I ended up creating a bg named "a", a bg named "b", and a bg named "c". Reserve characters 1 to 25 of the name of each card for a unique name, then use char 26 as an index for the b cards, and char 27 as an index for the c cards. Now the script of your "up" button for bg "b" needs to be something like: on mouseUp get the name of this cd put char 1 to 25 of it into aCard go to cd aCard of bg "a" -- do whatever error checking you like here.... end mouseUp and similarly for "up" btn for bg "c" The "next" button is much easier: on mouseUp go next cd of this bg end mouseUp In my application, there was a problem with ensuring unique names, so I eventually went to a single card, and toggled the visibility of the fields and buttons to achieve the same effect. Hope this helps, Trent
tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney) (02/16/90)
In article <529@opus.NMSU.EDU> lrasmuss@nmsu.edu (Linda Rasmussen) writes: >Does anyone know of an easy way to create UP and NEXT buttons in a very large >hierarchical stack? It looks something like this: > > a a a > b b b b b b > c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c c > >There are at least a hundred "a" cards; what we need is for UP arrow >buttons to go up to the parent "b" if they are a "c", or up to the >parent "a" if they are a "b". We also need the NEXT arrows to go to >the next "a" if they are on an "a" card, the next "b" if they are on a >"b" card, etc. Obviously this can't be done with background arrows! >...But it is rather time consuming to have to script the up and >next arrows on EVERY card. There have been some other suggestions, but one limited the names of cards and the others assumed that you would always traverse the stack in hierarchical order, which could be violated by the "Back" and "Recent" commands and by use of the message box to give direct "go" commands". I think the easiest way is to have a hidden background field in the C cards (I'm assuming A, B, and C are different backgrounds -- they should be) containing the name or id of the parent card. Then you just have the next button equate to "go to background field Parent". You can set up up short-term scripts that make it easy to to set this field, by actually moving to a card rather than by typing, during the stack authoring process. As for the next buttons, they're trivial if A, B, and C are different backgrounds. "Go to next card of this background" accomplishes what you need. It's more difficult, but not enormously, if you want the C cards to "next" by parent rather than as one continuous circle; you just have to check the hidden field and keep going until you come back to one with the same parent as the current card. By the way, the parent field doesn't have to be hidden. Users might appreciate a visual indication of the parent of the current card. -- Tim Maroney, Mac Software Consultant, sun!hoptoad!tim, tim@toad.com FROM THE FOOL FILE: "American women, especially some of those on the net, might profit by being less concerned with their careers and more concerned with getting a good, old fashioned roll in the hay." -- William J. Fallon, wjf@cbnews.att.com, on soc.women (also uses the alias Walter J. Ficklestein)
ccc_ldo@waikato.ac.nz (02/16/90)
Another solution would be to adopt a systematic naming convention for your cards. That is, each card takes the name of its parent, to which it appends something extra unique to this level. Say you've got three layers in the hierarchy: a (the "root" level), b, and c (the "leaf" level). The root-level cards are named "a1", "a2" etc. The cards at level b are named "a1 b1", "a1 b2" etc. And the ones at level c are similarly named "a1 b1 c1", "a1 b1 c2" etc. Then your "up one level" button script becomes something like On MouseUp Get the short name of this card Delete last word of it Go to card it End MouseUp If all your cards share the same background, then the background should contain an OpenCard script, somewhat as follows: On OpenCard Get the short name of this card Set visible of background button "Up one level" to \l (the number of words in it = 1) End OpenCard (insert the appropriate continuation character in place of "\l"). This hides the button if you're already on a root-level card. Hope this works.