I'm with Kevin on this. As much as I love forcing the SRP EditTable to submit to my will (a testament to it's flexibility and power), this is becoming too much of a square peg and round hole. I've been trying to think of a way to incorporate the SRP Panel control since it gives you a way to present virtual and scrollable space. Nothing elegant was coming to me.
I know you expressed that you are moving on with one of Kevin's suggestions, but I seriously recommend reconsidering his other suggestion: a web control. Previously you mentioned something about IE prompting a message. This was because you were using JavaScript to interact with the clipboard. You can interact with OI via web browser events. Since it is just an OLE control, you can listen for its events and respond to them. It would be easier to just add image tags or hyperlinks and intercept the clicks. This is what OI 10 uses for its home dashboard. We've implemented this solution ourselves with a number of utilities and clients.
I think there are some posts in the Revelation forum that outline how this is done. If you want consulting help with getting the foundation started for this then contact us offline.
I will have another look at the OLE_IE thing. But as far as I know, OI can't extract information about what was clicked in a browser? I will have a look though. I will just make a test form and click things in the browser and see if any useful events get fired in OI.
Hi, I have decided to go with the report table. It's turned out very well. But is it possible to disable this tool tip from appearing whenever you mouse over a control?
I'm glad you are going with the ReportTable. It really is the best control we offer that handles the type of presentation and UI experience you need. Regarding the tooltip, what do you have in value 11 of the ColumnList property?
Although you are no longer looking at the OLE browser control, the answer to the question is "yes", you can tell OI what was clicked.
Although you are no longer looking at the OLE browser control, the answer to the question is "yes", you can tell OI what was clicked.
Really? That changes everything. If that's the case, why not use a browser for all interface elements, as the possibilities with javascript and css are endless.
Really? That changes everything. If that's the case, why not use a browser for all interface elements, as the possibilities with javascript and css are endless.
Yes, indeed. However, let's keep our expectations grounded. The web browser control is based on IE, so there are some limitations to what you can support in terms of HTML5 and JavaScript. As I mentioned earlier, OI 10 uses the IE browser control for its dashboard and it also uses a chromium based control for other areas. Each has a trade-off. IE supports OI-event interaction better but doesn't support modern web design very well. Chromium is the opposite. I don't know why Revelation couldn't get OI-event interaction to work as well as the IE control.
As far as your "why not use a browser for all interface elements" question, I would counter and ask, "why not just build a true web application"? Don't get me wrong, we are advocates of integrating web browser UI into OI applications, but if we were to design the entire UI using a web stack then it doesn't make sense to use OI at all. Perhaps I'm missing your point.
Furthermore, the standard OI developer (AFAIK) doesn't have the necessary skill set to build a full browser based UI. Plus, it is simply much easier and faster to develop forms and event handlers using the native tools within OI.
For what it is worth, we posted a blog article on how OI can push data into the actual IE browser (not just an embedded control). This isn't interactive, but it might be helpful to some.
Finally, here are some screenshots of one of the utilities I mentioned. It's called the SRP Interactive Report Utility. As you can see, it loads a report with embedded links which then callback into OI so more reports (i.e., essentially a drill down tool) can be loaded:
Just a point of clarification, this isn't a utility that we advertise publicly. There is nothing for you to check out at this point. I presented the above screenshots mostly to help you see the potential of incorporating HTML based reporting in OI along with interactive links.
We wrote this for a specific client but we have made it available to others. We did write some documentation for us but it will still require a bit of explanation so you understand the technical design requirements for your reports. If you want to discuss financial terms we can take this offline. Alternatively, if you want some consulting assistance so you can roll out your own solution we would be open to that arrangement as well.
Comments
I know you expressed that you are moving on with one of Kevin's suggestions, but I seriously recommend reconsidering his other suggestion: a web control. Previously you mentioned something about IE prompting a message. This was because you were using JavaScript to interact with the clipboard. You can interact with OI via web browser events. Since it is just an OLE control, you can listen for its events and respond to them. It would be easier to just add image tags or hyperlinks and intercept the clicks. This is what OI 10 uses for its home dashboard. We've implemented this solution ourselves with a number of utilities and clients.
I think there are some posts in the Revelation forum that outline how this is done. If you want consulting help with getting the foundation started for this then contact us offline.
Thanks for your help.
Although you are no longer looking at the OLE browser control, the answer to the question is "yes", you can tell OI what was clicked.
Emails crossed paths...
Really? That changes everything. If that's the case, why not use a browser for all interface elements, as the possibilities with javascript and css are endless.
Yes, indeed. However, let's keep our expectations grounded. The web browser control is based on IE, so there are some limitations to what you can support in terms of HTML5 and JavaScript. As I mentioned earlier, OI 10 uses the IE browser control for its dashboard and it also uses a chromium based control for other areas. Each has a trade-off. IE supports OI-event interaction better but doesn't support modern web design very well. Chromium is the opposite. I don't know why Revelation couldn't get OI-event interaction to work as well as the IE control.
As far as your "why not use a browser for all interface elements" question, I would counter and ask, "why not just build a true web application"? Don't get me wrong, we are advocates of integrating web browser UI into OI applications, but if we were to design the entire UI using a web stack then it doesn't make sense to use OI at all. Perhaps I'm missing your point.
Furthermore, the standard OI developer (AFAIK) doesn't have the necessary skill set to build a full browser based UI. Plus, it is simply much easier and faster to develop forms and event handlers using the native tools within OI.
For what it is worth, we posted a blog article on how OI can push data into the actual IE browser (not just an embedded control). This isn't interactive, but it might be helpful to some.
Finally, here are some screenshots of one of the utilities I mentioned. It's called the SRP Interactive Report Utility. As you can see, it loads a report with embedded links which then callback into OI so more reports (i.e., essentially a drill down tool) can be loaded:
We wrote this for a specific client but we have made it available to others. We did write some documentation for us but it will still require a bit of explanation so you understand the technical design requirements for your reports. If you want to discuss financial terms we can take this offline. Alternatively, if you want some consulting assistance so you can roll out your own solution we would be open to that arrangement as well.
I think I can figure it out myself. I will create a test html page with hyperlinks and then click them in the debugger and see what events get fired.
Thanks for your help though.