Request for feedback
Michael Doub
mikedoub at gmail.com
Sun Nov 30 11:56:43 EST 2014
I would like the lists assistance in flushing out a enhancement request
proposal that I would like to make to the development team. Because of a
bug in the pageranges function where it did not take into account the
spaceabove and spacebelow properties, i attempted to do this manually.
I quickly learned that there is no easy way to understand where a line
is actually wrapped. I was using the formatted size functions measuring
each character and run and getting different answers when measuring the
same text. This was attributed to kerning and letter spacing issues by
the support folks. This was not a very satisfying answer.
After working on this for several weeks, I have come to the conclusion
that we can not accurately reproduce the algorithms of the field object
with the current tools available to us. I would loved to be proven
wrong here, but I threw in the towel and starting thinking about the the
information that is really needed to understand what is actually being
displayed within a field.
I am proposing that a property or function be added to livecode field
object. It would be similar to styled text, but it would provide a
PERFECT representation of what is being displayed within a field. The
structure returned would include all attributes needed to understand
exactly how a field is laid out and how the text was flowed within the
field.
For the purposes of this discussion a field is made up of lines.
A line is a string terminated by a return. A line is made up of
softlines. A line may contain a single softline or multiple softlines.
A softline is single row of text that fits in the visual area within the
field. SoftLines are made up of runs as defined in styledtext. A tab
character is considered a run.
Ok to be clear, a softline is each segment of a line that was wrapped to
fit in to the field. ;-)
put the formatedStyledAttributes of fld "foo" into rArray
rArray:
"height":
"width":
"dontwrap":
"borderwidth":
"leftMargin":
"topMargin":
"rightMargin":
"bottomMargin":
[line_Nbr] -- a number for each string terminated by a return
"borderwidth":
"leftIndent":
"rightIndent":
"padding":
"spaceAbove":
"spaceBelow":
[softline_number] -- this the segment of the line on a row
within a field
"MaxformattedHeight": -- of the softline including all runs
"MaxformattedWidth": -- of the softline including all runs
"leftIndent":
"firstIndent": -- only applicable to the first segment of
a paragraph
"rightIndent":
"padding":
[run_number] -- this is the run within the soft line
-- a tab character is considered
a run
"textSize":
"textFont":
"textStyle":
"text":
formattedHeight:
formattedWidth: -- when text = tab, this is the length
of space
-- allocated to the tab
[run_number + 1]
[softline_number + 1]
[pgh_Nbr + 1]
I added the MaxFormatted Height/Width so it would be easer to calculate
the scroll positions. A function that would tell you the softline
number of a given chunk would also be a huge help.
I look forward to hearing your comments about this proposal. I am
specifically looking for suggestions on how lists should be handled.
Regards,
Mike
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