Re: non-blocking delay in dialog emulation subclass

["Matthew Braid" <ptkperl mdb id au>]

Hi,

2008/7/17 zentara <zentara1 sbcglobal net>:
> On Wed, 16 Jul 2008 14:43:53 -0400 (EDT)
> Well the idea is not just for color. I'm looking for a general purpose
> popup that returns whatever I want, instead of integers(like a dialog).
> I might want a textbox, or entries, etc.

Rather than making a whole new class of dialogs, I usually use a
wrapper package that does the work for me.

For instance, if I want a dialog that asks for a single line of input,
that package might have a sub like:

sub ask {
 my $self = shift;
 my ($question) = @_;
 my $dlg = Gtk2::Dialog->new(....);
 # Set up the dialog how you want. In this case we'd put a label and
an entry in.
 # The entry is important, so I'll keep that bit of code here
 my $ent = Gtk2::Entry->new;
 # Pack everything, and then ready to go
 my $res = $dlg->run;
 $dlg->hide;
 # If your 'get the result' section is a bit long, you might want to do a
 # Gtk2->main_iteration while (Gtk2->events_pending);
 # to make the dialog hide _now_
 if ($res eq 'ok') {
   $res = $ent->get_text;
 } else {
   $res = undef;
 }
 $dlg->destroy;
 return $res;
}

This package is normally called something like TOP::LEVEL::Dialog
(where TOP::LEVEL is the namespace my app is using), and then you can
just add subs like the above to do the work for you, instantiate that
package (with important details like the window to be modal on etc),
and then just do stuff like:

my $txt = $dialogs->ask("Enter planet to destroy: ");
if (defined($txt)) {...}

More complex dialogs might have their own callback package as well -
this method allows you to have dialogs as complex as you want that
return exactly the data you want without having to fill your main code
with all the 'build the dialog' details.

Oh, and I used to use a jerry-rigged version of Tk's waitVariable for
custom dialogs as well, but the whole $dlg->run thing is much better.

MB