I'm attempting to create a log-in window inside an NSMenu (attached to the an NSStatusItem in the menu bar).
I have blank NSMenuItems in the menu. I then set the views of the menu items to NSTextFields.
It ends up looking like this:
The textfields also interact strangely. Clicking on them only gives them focus (so you can enter text) about 30% of the time.
So, I'm wondering:
-How do do I make these look better? How do I control the padding, etc?
-What's with the clicking behavior I described above? Typing only works 30% of the time.
-Are there any other apps that use such a statusbar item as a field? I'd like to take a look.
To answer your actual question instead of discussing the UI design...
Alternative:
Consider using the MAAttachedWindow project from Matt Gemmel:
Download the use an MAAttachedWindow with an NSStatusItem example.
Link:
http://mattgemmell.com/source/index.html
Quickly created example:
Used controls:
- NSTextField (Focus:None DrawsBackground:No TextColor:White)
- NSButton (Bezel:Recessed)
- NSLabel (TextColor:White)
Related
I have two window controllers (with their own view controllers) on a storyboard.
In one window, I have the main program, a basic text editor with an NSTextView. In the other window, I have a single button.
I found out how to get the window to display by linking it to a menu item. It works.
The main window is linked to my ViewController class by default. The second window is also linked to the ViewController class and has its button linked to an IBAction in the ViewController class.
I have some simple code in the IBAction that basically tells the NSTextView to change its font size to a much bigger font. I have confirmed that the code itself works when called in other methods.
The button works, BUT it is using an entirely different instance of my ViewController class. So in result: the text size doesn't change.
So my main question here is how do I get an IBAction in one window to affect an object in another window.
I hope I did an alright job at explaining myself. Keep in mind this is my first Stack Overflow question:) I tried my best to research this question but mostly found information on iOS development and using XIB files.
It sounds like you have two windows with the same controller class but want what happens in one window to affect the other window. The easiest way is going to be with notifications. When the button is clicked in one window a notification gets posted that all instances of ViewController receive and respond to by changing the font size as needed. You could also look into setting a user default when the button is clicked and using bindings to keep the text field's font size tied to the current default.
I am trying to tidy up my UI by consolidating various things in a Tool Bar, and am utterly confused. I am using Interface Builder rather than constructing the controls programmatically, because my UI is fairly simple and not particularly dynamic.
What I did did so far:
Added an empty tool bar.
Dragged two previously existing and working buttons onto the tool bar. They changed their class from UIButton
to UIBarButtonItem, and the inspector now shows them as having no
Sent Actions or Referencing Outlet, but the the previous action &
outlet in the View Controller - responding to taps, setting the
label of the button - still work.
Created a new Button directly
in the tool bar. Wired up its action & outlet by ctrl-drag in the
normal way. The inspector shows the Action and Outlet for this
button as connected, which is nice, but sadly neither of them works.
Clicking the button does not invoke the action; setting the label of
the button does not cause anything to happen on the screen, even
after I tried prodding the tool bar with a setNeedsDisplay.
I'm not sure what to try next. Googling has shown me that I'm not the only person to find using UIToolBar via Interface Bulder difficult and confusing, but I haven't found a solution to my exact problem.
I don't particularly want to resort to creating my entire GUI programmatically just to tidy up a few buttons. Creating all the controls in Interface Builder outside the tool bar, getting them wired up and working, then moving them into the tool bar would presumably also work - but it would be a kludge, and would leave me still none the wiser if anything went wrong later.
Should you try using UIBarButtonItem instead of UIButton? It works for me.
i had a similar issue.
Did you created an extra UITapGestureRecognizer for root view ?
Maybe for something like > When elsewhere than UITextView clicked, resignFirstResponder for all UITextViews !
In my case, on 7.1, that extra UITapGestureRecognizer prevented transfer of event to IBAction of UIBarButtonItem which is inside an UIToolBar.
IBAction was made on Storyboard by Ctrl+Drag.
on 8.1 it was working. Not on 7.1
Read some suggestions to create an extra UIView and putting all visual elements into that extra UIView except UIToolBar
how can i go about making a custom NSMenu for a menulet such as this?
Is this an NSMenu or is it a borderless window and if so how would i go about this?
Thanks!
It's an app running running on the OSX status bar.
See Status Bar Programming at Apple. Also, NSStatusBar and NSStatusItem
This SO post has some additional pointers:
How to create a Menubar application for Mac
More specifically it could be an NSPopover, an NSWindow, or even NSStatusItem.view's custom view. In the case of an NSWindow (often a utility form of NSPanel) (or the NSPopover) you would manually open the window when the status item is clicked, using the status item's -(void)setAction and -(void)setTarget. If you use a custom view for the status item, this would be done in -mouseDown:.
Check out this post - I found it useful.
Look at the documentation for NSStatusItem. I believe you can have it display a view instead of a standard NSMenu which is what it looks like they are doing in that image.
I write an "Agent" Cocoa app where I have TextField in status icon's menu, it looks like this:
(source: ifotos.pl)
And in couple of places I select its contents programmatically (e.g. in -(BOOL)becomeFirstResponder of my NSTextField subclass)
And it doesn't work. It surely has something to do with the fact that it's in menu, not in window. But how do I fix that?
Because your view is in a menu, it's possible that the textfield isn't responding because the run loop is not in its default mode. Try calling selectText: like this:
[textField performSelector:#selector(selectText:) withObject:nil
afterDelay:0.0 inModes:[NSArray arrayWithObject:NSRunLoopCommonModes]];
Why don't you just use a window instead? Menus are implemented as windows under the hood: you can do the same thing, just position and style your window appropriately.
Edit: answer largely rewritten
I want to show a total inside a toolbar. I put in IB the UILabel on top of the toolbar .
However, when I run the app, the UILabel is totally invisible (but can set values on code fine).
The most bizarre thing is that in other form, all work fine. I don't see why in one form work but not in another...
Any idea in how fix this? Or why is this behaviour happening?
Don't use a UILabel.
Use a UIBarButtonItem. Then set it to style: plain. It looks like a label, but it actually borderless button. This is the general practice of displaying text on a bar.
You can also create UIBarButtonItem with a custom view in code. You are simple "wrapping" the UILabel in a UIBarButtonItem allowing you to add anything you want to a tool bar.
To add in response to comment:
Either way, you make the button "inactive" and it doesn't respond to touches. Even though it is a button, it doesn't appear to be one. This is how Apple expects to add views to a toolbar/navbar as apposed to "float things on top of it". It violates no HIG guidelines, much the opposite, it is a reccomended design technique.
To stop the glow:
Create the button programmatically, make sure it is disabled, add it to the bar, it should then be disabled, but not dim.
In IB, have you tried to select the label and use the "Bring to Font" menu item (under Layout)? It seems like you are trying to do something pretty standard.
When you try to set values, is the label coming up as nil or at address 0x0? It's possible that the label is there, but its text cannot be set because its instance is faulty (not properly connected in IB to the IBOutlet).... Just put a breakpoint on the line where you are trying to set the value(s) for the label, and verify that the label variable is not nil (or 0x0). If it's not, try setting the text and verify on the next line that its text was set properly.
drag a UIButton into your UIToolBar. Then uncheck User Interaction Enables for this button.
Customize your UIButton so that it will look like a UILabel. Hope this will help you.