New Field Property for accurate rendering information
Posted: Mon Dec 01, 2014 10:04 pm
I would like the forums 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 started 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 into the field.
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 started 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 into the field.
Code: Select all
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
-- these are included to make
-- calculating scroll positions easier
"leftIndent":
"firstIndent": -- only applicable to the first
-- segment of a paragraph
"rightIndent":
"padding":
"listIndent": -- listIndent and listdepth are needed
"listdepth": -- as part of the softline because lists
-- can wrap
[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]
