open a palette window over a modal window under OS 9

[Ken Ray]

> I've got an application that we are supposed to release this week, so
> this is kind of urgent. In this app, I've got a main window that
> opens a stack as modal. This is so the user cannot interact with the
> main window while the other is open. But then from the modal window,
> there is a help stack that I open as a palette. This works fine under
> Windows and OS X, but under OS 9, there's a problem. The palette
> stack does not get focus when it opens, and you cannot interact with
> it at all. You can't even close it. It's like the modal stack is
> taking over, and in fact, when I click anywhere in the palette stack,
> I get the beep from the computer indicating that I can't do anything
> with it. The palette window does open over the top of the modal one,
> however. Then once I close the modal window, I can interact with the
> palette. Bug? Shouldn't it behave the same way on all platforms?

I have encountered the same thing, but with a different circumstance. In my
case, it is a palette that displays data that may show an alert window if a
(legitimate) error is encountered. When the modal dialog displays, it is
*under* the palette (stacking order-wise), but the titlebar of the palette
is disabled indicating that it is not the active window, but the modal
dialog's titlebar is enabled, showing that it *is* the active window.
However in my case it's kind of deadly because sometimes the modal dialog is
smaller than the palette, and so when it opens, it's *underneath* the
palette and there's nothing I can do.

I did notice that in some cases when this happens and I can see a portion of
the modal dialog window, I can click on the Finder, and then click back on
the palette, which makes it "active", and then I can move it or close it.

Personally I think this is a window layering bug, so if you log it in
Bugzilla, I'll add my votes.


Ken Ray
Sons of Thunder Software
Email: kray at sonsothunder.com
Web Site: http://www.sonsothunder.com/