Window action definition

Window action definition (ADA_WinAction) are required in order to start a dialog via button click or menu item selection. The window action defines a link between the dialog data source and the window or form to be shown when starting the dialog.

In order to open the window action browser, Objects/Window Actions has to be selected from the Designer's main menu or tool bar:

Project definitions support

• Detailed definition of the window data source (2)
• Defining a link to the dialog window (3)
• Associating control context class (1)

An implicit EditEntry window action will be created by the GUI framework referring to the Edit window in a GUI class. When defining a window with the name Edit in a GUI class, the default action EditEntry (F4) automatically opens the edit window, i.e. in order to support instance edit functions, one need not to define an EditEntry window action for each GUI class as long as the GUI class provides an Edit window.

The dialog window is defined as window or dialog reference. The referenced window is a method of a design class. The name of the GUI class name (Class) and the window name (Window) together define the window reference. The reference is not a physical, but a reference by name, only, i.e. GUI class and window need not to exist when being referenced here.

When starting a window action, the data source is inherited from the parent control. Typiclly, window actions called via context menus inherit the data source from the control displaying the context menu. When calling a window action from a tool bar or the application main menu, usually an explicit data source definition is required, since the data source for a project is usually the database.

Another possibility for referring to a control data source is defining a "bubble path" in the action definition (ADK_EventActionControl) , which directs the action to the control context referenced in the path.

Details for defining data source properties are described in Data source definition..

In general, it is possible to define the window context in a window action.This will overwrite context classes associated in the window definition or control definition. This is, however, not suggested, since it is difficult to maintain. Overloading the windows context class might, however, become necessary, when the dialog behaves different when being called via a window action.

More details about creating and implementing GUI context classes are described in Assigning GUI context classes in Designer. How to implement context classes is described in Context classes.