Are Highlight buttons unsupported?

Keisuke Miyako (4/29/14 3:26 PM)

Hello,

I think I posted the same information before,
but my understanding is that the source is a demo DB called "4D
Objects"
which can be downloaded from resources:

http://www.4d.com/support/resources.html

direct link:

ftp://ftp.4d.com/SAMPLE_DATABASES/4D/4D_v13/demo_dbs/4DObjects.zip

if you launch the DB and move to page 9,

you see the footnote,

"This type of button is obsolete and should not be used anymore"

for Highlight buttons.

*

color><param>00000,0000,DDEE/param>=From here is speculation.
/color>
As explained in the documentation, highlight buttons are

"designed to be placed on top of graphic objects. Highlight buttons are
transparent. When the user clicks a highlight button, the graphics of
the
button are highlighted."

http://doc.4d.com/4D-Design-Reference-13.4/Working-with-active-objects/But
t
ons.300-1226554.en.html

I think the concept of "highlighting the graphics underneath" is the
basis
of regarding the object as obsolete.

Highlight buttons used to invoke the old MacOS highlight where colours
were inverted,
but that convention is obviously out-of-date.

Since 2004, 4D implements "system highlight" throughout the
application,
but the old invert effect was still used for listforms with the "system
hightlight" property unchecked,
or form objects with a non-system "platform interface" (removed in
v13).

The old invert effect can cause redraw issues,
so it is recommended to activate "system highlight" on all listforms,
and apply the "system" platform interface if using v12 or earlier.

My understanding is that highlight buttons now work by appliing a
semi-translucent system highlight colour,
on Windows v13, as opposed to inverting the background image,
so in that sense, they should still be functional in v13 on Windows.

But,
transparency is not available in the GDI+ API of Windows,
which may explain why you see ?=80úblack" in some cases.

(v13 defaults to GDI+ if the more modern Direct2D API is unavailable or
disabled by SET DATABASE PARAMETER)

I suspect the same might happen on Windows 7+, if the "classic" desktop
theme was used.

On Windows the user can selecta a deskop theme, but the "classic" is a
special theme,
which is actually not a theme but a switch to activate the legacy API.

Some users may think the "classic" theme is less demanding for the
computer,
or may simply prefer it for its design,
but actually the effect might be quite the contrary for that reason.

So to summarize,
highlight by inverting colours is deprecated,

semi-transparency requires a modern Windows system,
and the current highlight button depends on semi-transparency for its
visual effect.

the alternative is a 3D button with active/inactive/hover/focus states.

miyako

On 2014/04/27 10:16, "Keith Goebel" <keith.g@... wrote:

color><param>00000,0000,DDEE/param>11) Are highlight buttons
unsupported and, if so, from which 4D version?
(there is no mention of this in the v13.4 Design Ref manual)
/color>

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Summary created 4/29/14 at 8:29AM by Intellex Corporation

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