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Q57924: Buttons Not Allowed in Resizeable Windows in 7.00 UI Toolbox

Article: Q57924
Product(s): See article
Version(s): 7.00
Operating System(s): MS-DOS
Keyword(s): ENDUSER | SR# S891108-73 | mspl13_basic
Last Modified: 2-FEB-1990

Resizable windows created by the WindowOpen procedure of the
WINDOW.BAS User Interface (UI) Toolbox file are not allowed to contain
buttons. This design of the UI Toolbox is not documented. This
information applies to Microsoft BASIC Professional Development System
(PDS) Version 7.00 for MS-DOS and MS OS/2.

Microsoft BASIC PDS 7.00 comes with toolbox files that allow you to
program windows, menus, scroll bars, edit fields, and buttons. One of
the files, WINDOW.BAS, contains a procedure called ButtonOpen, which
opens a button in the current window. Windows themselves can be opened
with another procedure in WINDOW.BAS called WindowOpen.

Among the many attributes you can specify when opening a window is
whether or not the window can be resized. If this attribute is
specified, making the window resizable, the ButtonOpen procedure will
not open a button in that window. ButtonOpen doesn't report this as an
error; it simply doesn't open the button.

Although this design is not documented, it is obvious when examining
the source code of the ButtonOpen procedure and is considered a
limitation, not a problem.

The source code of the User Interface Toolbox files (WINDOW.BAS,
MENU.BAS, MOUSE.BAS, and GENERAL.BAS) is provided so that you can
modify them if you want to overcome any of their inherent limitations,
such as the one described above. This modification can be safely done
only if you have a full understanding of every module of the User
Interface Toolbox, which may require much time and effort.

However, a less safe but much quicker workaround for the above
limitation has been used successfully. (Note: This procedure has not
been extensively tested and is not guaranteed by Microsoft to work
properly under any circumstances.)

To use this workaround, comment out the line "resize = TRUE" in the
ButtonOpen procedure of the WINDOW.BAS file. It is the first and only
line inside the first IF/END structure of the procedure. The following
code fragment identifies the IF/END structure and the statement that
must be commented out:

   IF MID$(WindowBorder$(GloWindow(WindowCurrent).windowType), 9, 1) =
   "+" THEN
       resize = TRUE   'Comment out this statement.
   END IF

After commenting out the line, the ButtonOpen procedure will open
buttons in a resizable window. However, it is your responsibility to
make sure that any buttons opened stay within the window boundaries
after any resizing has been done.

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