General

Apart from this documentation there are also some commentated examples of some Widgets, as well as a complete example for the GUI of a Setup-program (app2.pl).

using widgets

A new Widget is always created by

     $WIDGET_REFERENCE=Paw::WIDGETNAME->new(PARAMETERNAME=>VALUE).

The PARAMETERs must be passed as HASH (PARAMETERNAME=>VALUE) to the widget, even if there is only one parameter for the widget. The methods of a widget are used by

     $WIDGET_REFERENCE->METHOD(PARAMETER)
     $WIDGET_REFERENCE->METHOD(PARAMETER1=>VALUE1, PARAMETER2=>VALUE2)

If the method permits only one or zero parameters, it's not necessary to designate the parameter in a HASH, for example

     $window->put($widget).

If more than 1 parameter is possible, then each parameter must be designated by it's name, for example

     $window->abs_move_curs(new_x=>5, new_y=>6) #is okay,

while

     $window->abs_move_curs(5) # is not okay
     $window->put_dir("h")     # is quite permitted.

Initialisation

Every program that uses this modul looks the same in the first lines of code.

     #!/usr/bin/perl
     use Curses;
     use widget;
     ($columns, $rows)=Paw::init_widgetset();

$columns and $rows contains the terminal width and height. This values can be used to calculate the size or position of other windows, for example

     $main_win=Paw::Window->new(abs_x=>1, abs_y=>1,
                               height=$rows-3, width=>$columns-2,
                               color=>1, statusbar=>1);

Colors

While the initialisation of the widgetset, some colorpairs are set.

     init_pair(1, COLOR_WHITE, COLOR_BLUE);   #default colors
     init_pair(31, COLOR_BLACK, COLOR_BLACK); #shadow
     init_pair(30, COLOR_BLACK, COLOR_CYAN);  #pulldown menu
     init_pair(29, COLOR_BLACK, COLOR_BLUE);  #filedialog

Already defined colors are black, red, green, yellow, blue, magenta, cyan, and white New colorpairs can be created by :

     init_pair(pair, foreground_color, background_color);

Further information about the colormodel can be found in the documentation of the curses lib (man ncurses, perldoc Curses).

Widgetpacker

There are two ways how to get widgets into a window. The first one is to use the put($widget) function of the window, the second way is to use boxes (recommended).

without boxes:

     #put the $label2 into the window
     $win2->put($label2);                      
     #tell to packer to put the next widget horizontally to the $label2
     $win2->put_dir("h");   # horizontal packen    
     #keep on putting widgets ...
     $win2->put($butt1);    # Button for Faktor 2 
     $win2->put($label3);   # Faktor 3             
     $win2->put($butt2);    # Button for Faktor 3 
     $win2->put($label4);   # Faktor 4             
     $win2->put($butt3);    # Button for Faktor 4
     #switch the packer to vertikal-mode...
     $win2->put_dir("v");
     #...to get the label under the other widgets.
     $win2->put($label5);   # "Ergebnis : ..."

We will get

     $label2 $butt1 $label3 $butt2 $label4 $butt3                                        
     $label5

     Faktor 2 [ ] Faktor 3 [ ] Faktor 4 [ ]
     Ergebnis : 200

This type of widget-packing is nice for smaller GUIs and surely a fast solution but you will come very fast to the boundaries of your possibilities. Then the boxes seems to be the better solution.

A box takes up several widgets and puts them always either horizontal or vertically. The Clou at a box is that it can also take up other boxes. It is possible that a horizontal box is to be packed into a vertical box and this in any depth. If you know the widgetpacker of GTK or TK, you know this widgetpacker too.

     ###########################################
     # 7 Buttons building an H
     ###########################################

     $vbox0->put($b1);

     $hbox1->put($b2);
     $hbox1->put($b3);

     $vbox0->put($hbox1);
     $vbox0->put($b4);

     $hbox0->put($vbox0);

     $vbox1->put($b5);
     $vbox1->put($b6);
     $vbox1->put($b7);

     $hbox0->put($vbox1);

     $win->put($hbox0);

We will get:

     [1]   [5]
     [2][3][6]
     [4]   [7]

CPAN RT

General

using widgets

Initialisation

Colors

Widgetpacker

SEE ALSO

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