The new PowerMenu control is nearly done. There are two features that need to be implemented. 1) a pin button so you can dock and undock the ribbon. 2) a scroll bar so you can scroll through the ribbon if the width is too small to display all the contents.
Everything has been ported to all supported versions of PowerBuilder. The new ribbon brings a nice look to PB9 applications.
In addition to the new PowerMenu control, the following enhancements have been implemented:
Toolbar: Problem in of_IsInObject when ToolBarStrip is not at window's (0, 0) position
Toolbar: Option to display text under image. New function of_DisplayTextUnderImage().
ShortcutBar: Outlook shortcutbar: of_reset() does not hide objects
TabControl: Missing a line of Code in of_mouseleave. Check visibility flag.
TabControl: SetFocus() not Activating Window.
PictureButton: ToolBarStrip as a replacement for the PictureButton.
PowerDock: of_AddDockItem with window. Allow windows to be open as dock items.
XPListBar: XP ListBar, group closing automatically. New events added GroupExpanding and GroupCollapsing.
It didn't take long. The new PowerBuilder "ribbon" control is almost complete (version 1 at least). There is one major obstacle that needs to be dealt with and a couple minor items that need to be coded:
Major:
- Figuring out what to do when the ribbon is too large for the screen. Traditionally, ribbon controls will shrink to fit, adjusting the layout as the window sizes. Version 1 may not have this capability. I'm thinking of other ways to address this.
Minor:
- Code the option that allows you to hide item text (i.e. displaytext:false).
- Add an option to add tooltips to menu items. I may use a combination of the menu text and the menu microhelp properties.
- Port toolbar controls item selection effects to the ribbon. This is the highlighting you see when the mouse moves over an item.
- Function to rebuild ribbon if the menu changes (ChangeMenu or while opening a sheet that has it's own menu).
The only other issue I see right now is that this new control renders items based on their order in the menu. Currently, the only way to ensure proper order is to make sure that the items are in the proper order in your menu.
I'm hoping to get this control into the hands of some developers by the weekend.
PowerToTheBuilder is working hard to develop a new Ribbon\Menu control for PowerBuilder applications. This new object is going to be PowerBuilders take on the Office Ribbon. Instead of calling it a Ribbon, it will most likely be refered to as a enhanced menu (PowerMenu). The idea is to make the entire control render based on the items that are on the windows menu. See image below.
There will be some setup required in order to get everything looking and working properly. All items are rendered based on the order that they appear in the menu. If you want to change the order, you have to rearrange your menu items. Attributes in the menu items tag propertly will be used to control how items are displayed. For example, to put an item in a group you would add the following to the menu items tag:
group:File
To make an item appear as a large icon, you would add the following:
group:File;size:large
To hide text and only display an icon (icon is driven from the toolbar item property on the menu item):
group:File;displaytext:false
Or
group:File;size:large;displaytext:false // to display as large icon with no text
If no group is specified, the menu item will be put into it's own group. The group name will be the same as the menu item text.
I'll post more updates in the coming days.
The Werysoft Team
Version 2.6.3 of the UI controls are now available for download. This release focuses on performance improvements and bug fixes.
You should now experience no flickering in the tab control and powerdock control. The buttonlistbar was enhanced a bit to make it perform a little quicker whan no image is specified for a button. The toolbar control had a bug that caused it to crash when resizing if there are items on both the left and right side.
Please let us know if you see any other issues or if you have an enhancement idea.
The Werysoft Team
Until Jan 30, 2010, Werysoft is offering the PB UI controls free to anyone who purchases a copy of QweryBuilder.
QweryBuilder is a database development and SQL query tool. Its purpose
is to make accessing information from a database simple, quick,
accurate and efficient. QweryBuilder implements innovative ideas to
make this possible. An end user can extract and update data without
writing a line of SQL. Database developers can create ad-hoc queries,
procedures, tables, views and triggers with fewer keystrokes. Best of
all, you can do this with your SQL Server, ASE, SQL Anywhere and Oracle
databases in one single application.
If you purchase QweryBuilder and would like the PB UI controls, just send us an email with your QB license code. We will then email the PB UI Control source to you.
Thanks,
The Werysoft Team
Werysoft is very excited to announce the release of
QweryBuilder 5.3.0.
5.3.0 contains some very significant changes. Prior versions had
connection information on the applications main toolbar. This has been
moved to the individual query windows. We felt that this made it easier
to know which data source a query window was connected to. In addition
to this, we concentrated on making this the most stable and bug free
release to date. Our goal was to remove all bugs...and for the most
part, we were successful. With that said, if you do find a bug we will
fix it as quick as possible so please let us know about them.
Here are a few other things that we did in this release:
- Added better support for Vista and Windows 7. The application
will now treat the Program Files directory as read only and put user
generated files and data in the My Documents folder.
- Added multi-select functionality to the SQL editor.
- Support XML results in Sybase ASE and SQL Anywhere.
- Selecting numeric or date data in a result grid will now show more details about the data.
- Each SQL query window will now have an SQL History drop down.
- New updated look and new application icon.
- Better support for remote desktop.
- SQL editor syntax folding has been improved.
- Added more documentation to Werysoft.com.
We are always interested in hearing from you. Please let us know what you think of the new QweryBuilder (through our
survey,
email or
online forum). Please
let us know if you find any bugs or any other issues.
Thanks,
The Werysoft Team
A new blog was created for Werysoft and QweryBuilder.
http://werysoft.blogspot.com/
2010 is going to be an exciting year for Werysoft. As you may or may not know, Werysoft produces products such as QweryBuilder and the PB UI Controls from PowerToTheBuilder.com. We used 2009 to build quality into our products. We just released a new version of the UI controls and by the end of this year we will put out a new release of QweryBuilder. This next release of QweryBuilder is especially important to us. We believe that the product has been brought to the next level with regards to performance, useablity and reliability.
In 2010, in addition to continuing our goal of building quality, we will be making our presence in the market much more prominent. QweryBuilder has had very little exposure yet it has become a success. We want to use this momentum to make it even more successful.
One of the things that makes QweryBuilder so great is the affordable price tag. Large IT Departments can use QweryBuilder for a flat price of $1500USD. This covers all your employee's (including your super users). Compare this to the competition and you will be saving tens of thousands of dollars. For smaller IT Departments, single licenses cost only $100USD. How many tools out there will give you productivity in SQL Server, Oracle and Sybase database's for that price?
Have questions? Please email us at Info@Werysoft.com. We look forward to hearing from you.
The Werysoft Team
With this release comes more toolbar enhancements. A new "Group" option has been added. This will allow you to group many toolbar items into one. An arrow will display next to the toolbar item. Once clicked, a drop menu will display all the toolbar items in that group. Clicking on one will envoke its clicked event and make it the default button on the group toolbar item.
This is how you use it. First you have to add a new group. Using the id's returned from of_AddGroup and of_AddItem, call of_AssignItemToGroup to put everything together. The of_SetGroupItem function will set the default button that's displayed in the group within the toolbar. If this method is not called, the last item added to the group will be displayed in the toolbar.
//Add menu toolbar items
Long ll_group, ll_b, ll_s, ll_o, ll_c
ll_group = uo_toolbarstrip.of_AddGroup()
ll_b = uo_toolbarstrip.of_AddItem('Blue','blue.bmp')
ll_s = uo_toolbarstrip.of_AddItem('Silver','silver.bmp')
ll_o = uo_toolbarstrip.of_AddItem('Olive','olive.bmp')
ll_c = uo_toolbarstrip.of_AddItem('Classic','classic.bmp')
uo_toolbarstrip.of_DisplayText(ll_group, TRUE)
//Assign new toolbar items to group
uo_toolbarstrip.of_AssignItemToGroup(ll_group,ll_b)
uo_toolbarstrip.of_AssignItemToGroup(ll_group,ll_s)
uo_toolbarstrip.of_AssignItemToGroup(ll_group,ll_o)
uo_toolbarstrip.of_AssignItemToGroup(ll_group,ll_c)
//Set the default group item
CHOOSE CASE uo_toolbarstrip.il_CurrentTheme
CASE uo_toolbarstrip.BLUE
uo_toolbarstrip.of_SetGroupItem (ll_group, ll_b)
CASE uo_toolbarstrip.SILVER
uo_toolbarstrip.of_SetGroupItem (ll_group, ll_s)
CASE uo_toolbarstrip.OLIVE
uo_toolbarstrip.of_SetGroupItem (ll_group, ll_o)
CASE ELSE
uo_toolbarstrip.of_SetGroupItem (ll_group, ll_c)
END CHOOSE
We're reaching out to our user base to see how we can improve our PowerBuilder UI
product. In the last two months we have seen that the UI controls were
downloaded nearly 1200 times. In this same two month period we have recorded
approx. 3 new customers. What this tells us is that either a large
number of the downloads are coming from people only needing this product for personal use or that this product does not add value to your applications.
It's the latter that we are concerned about. How can we make this library of UI controls better for you? From your perspective, what are its limitations?
We are very excited to hear from you and to get your thoughts on the matter. Please email us at Sales@Werysoft.com.
Thanks,
The Werysoft Team