Re: IB Woes
Re: IB Woes
- Subject: Re: IB Woes
- From: Brock Brandenberg <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 08 Aug 2003 10:41:05 -0500
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I'm implementing an Inspector.
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Normally a floating window would be what I'd use, but since this is a
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multi-document app, I want each document to have it's own Inspector.
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So I put it in a drawer, because it then is visually attached to its
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document and can easily be hidden and shown on a per-document basis.
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Unfortunately this size limit might force me to go for the floating
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window, but a floating inspector window that's bigger than the window
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it's inspecting seems odd, as well...
Here's an option that I've used before when constrained for space. It's not
a good solution for UI elements that regularly need access during the use of
your program because it can cause some to be concealed requiring the user to
scroll to find them, but it works very well for groups of items that get
infrequent use and are typically accessed many at a time. For example, I use
it to fit several distinct groups of NSForm text fields under one tab in a
small inspector window. When the user needs to enter data into the fields,
they will typically fill out all of the form elements at once under this
tab, then not touch the forms again unless an error was made or a change is
necessary. The progression through the forms suggests scrolling, so the user
doesn't miss any of the concealed UI elements. If you have a random
collection of radio buttons and checkboxes in your inspector where some
would be concealed, I'd strongly suggest against using this option. You
could try using a tabbed interface, though, and grouping items more
space-efficiently. Either way, they both work in windows or drawers.
Anyway, Mike Ferris' MOKit has a very nice collapsing view class called
MOViewListView that lets you stack views and temporarily collapse the ones
you don't need to see. You can see it in use in Project Builder in the
target settings editor. Just click on any of the bold, top-level categories
on the left of the PB target editor and you'll see all of the sub-settings
stacked to the right under the collapsing gray bars.
To use it, you simply drop a view in your nib and set it to the custom
MOViewListView subclass, make it a subview of a scroll view if you like,
then add each "stacked" subview to the MOViewListView programmatically in
your awakeFromNib method. This lets you layout each subview separately in IB
in its own NSView, keeping your inspector organization nice and tidy.
Brock Brandenberg
----- industrial design @ www.bergdesign.com ------
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