Enabling / disabling objects depending on the use

Hello tcoton,

Have you tried :

• Link all your buttons, edit etc... as normal with their actions

• Set all visible properties to FALSE for all elements on Form2

• Add visible property to TRUE for wanted elements with OnClik ?

procedure Form1_Button1_OnClick (Sender: string; var Cancel: boolean);
begin
    Form2.Edit1.Visible := True;
    Form2.Button_save1.Visible := True;
end;

procedure Form1_Button2_OnClick (Sender: string; var Cancel: boolean);
begin
    Form2.ComboBox1.Visible := true;
    Form2.Button_save2.Visible := True;
end;

procedure Form1_Button_ADD_OnClick (Sender: string; var Cancel: boolean);
begin
    Form2.Button_save1.Visible := True;
    Form2.Button_save2.Visible := True;
    Form2.ComboBox1.Visible := True;
    Form2.Edit1.Visible := True;
end;

procedure Form1_Button_EDIT_OnClick (Sender: string; var Cancel: boolean);
begin
    Form2.Button_save1.Visible := True;
    Form2.Button_save2.Visible := True;
    Form2.ComboBox1.Visible := True;
    Form2.Edit1.Visible := True;
    Form2.TableGrid1.Visible := True;
    Form2.Button_Edit.Visible := True;
end;

And then reset all elements visibility to FALSE on OnClose event of Form2 with :

procedure Form2_OnClose (Sender: string; Action: string);
begin
    Form2.Button_Edit.Visible := False;
    Form2.Button_save1.Visible := False;
    Form2.Button_save2.Visible := False;
    Form2.TableGrid1.Visible := False;
    Form2.ComboBox1.Visible := False;
    Form2.Edit1.Visible := False;
end;

Hi there,

hiding the objects is a fairly good idea, however, a large form would look pretty ugly, wouldn't it?

I will give it a try, thanks Mathmathou

Hi TCoton, Mathias,
Yes, it can make the form look unbalanced.
You could replaced the  xxx.visible := false  with xxx.enabled := false.  That might make it look better.
I've attached an example - it might not have all your conditions, but the principle is the same.
Derek.

Hey tcoton (and all the others following this very interesting thread),

I'm not sure to see where the problem is because in the small project attached :

• I simply use SetFocus on an object to get the correct focus on Form2

• Form2 size is different on each click of the 4 buttons

• some objects even change position on the Onclick event of Button_EDIT and come back to place on OnClose Form2

and it seams to work perfectly...

I could be wrong, but :

• did you set visibility to FALSE for all objects on Form2 in the Object Inspector ?

• do you reset every visibility to False on OnClose of Form2 ?

• Why use a tag when SetFocus works for me ?

I was confronted with something similar with conditional show of elements (green or red leds icons) on a function result and I find it faster to set Visible := False on conception (Object Inspector) and call Visible := True on event for only the objects needed, than the contrary.

But every Visible attribut have to be reset at a moment or another, otherwise they mix with next event and the display is messed up.

I choose OnClose as the reset event, but could also be OnShow ,or maybe OnClick on a SAVE button of Form2 I suppose....

Again, I realize this is a lot of code for visual effects", but you're trying to achieve something special right ?

Anyway, have a look at my code, you'll see focus is correct and resize and move elements as well.

Hope it helps

Cheers

Mathias

Derek's solution is pretty elegant, what is the function check?
I still, however get THE error: cannot focus a disabled or invisible window when I use SetFocus on different TextBoxes... weird!

Mathmathou's solution works as long as the button has no event. For example on ConditionalElements2 when addind the event: New record on Button_ADD, then disable Form2.Show in the script, you get THE error: cannot focus a disabled or invisible window.

Thanks Derek, nice example.

I am totally puzzled with the enable true or false with my project since it does not behave as expected, I managed somehow to remove the error message but the object activation is random.

I tried to disable everything on form2 and enable only what I need to make sense but I face the following issue when inspired by Derek's method using check = ...

All object are disabled in form2 by default.

On first run, if I click on button1 to trigger chek ='A', the objects I need are ok and the un-needed are disabled. Perfect

Then, I go back to form1 after doing my stuffs and I click on button2 to trigger check = 'B', the objects I need are enabled + the objects previously enabled!!

I do what I need and back to form1, I click on button3 to trigger check = 'C', the objects I need are enabled + the objects previously enabled!!

and so on... To reset, I have to close the app and restart. Any hint to reset the objects being enabled to their normal status "disabled" everytime?

Please do not tell me, I have to explicitly set the objects I do not need to disable in addition to the ones I want to be enabled

Focus works well though!

Aaaargh, too much script!

The final solution was to set default properties to disabled

and on check = '<matching letter>', I set the required objects to enabled to minimize scripting

I set the focus at last step once objects are enabled before the end;

on form2_close, I set all properties to disabled for reset

example (very short version):

procedure Details_Button_AddContract_OnClick (Sender: string; var Cancel: boolean);
begin
     check := 'E';
end;


procedure Data_Edition_OnShow (Sender: string; Action: string);
begin
     if check = 'E' then
     begin
    Data_edition.Edit_Tariff.Enabled:= True;
    Data_edition.Button1.Enabled:= True;// button save
    Data_edition.Edit_Tariff.SetFocus;
     end;
end;

procedure Data_Edition_OnClose (Sender: string; Action: string);
begin
    // Reset properties

    Data_edition.Edit_Tariff.Enabled:= False;
    Data_edition.Button1.Enabled:= False;// button save
end;

Please note that if a query has to be triggered in Form2, place it within the Button_On_Click procedure as it would not work with Form2_On_Show