Child windows Vis - revisited

[MichelC]

This is a variation of the "SetParent()" method.

It allows a cleaner creation of child windows Vis (less flickering and it also lets you define their initial location inside the parent window; the other method is very bad in that regard).

Both techniques consist in tricking LabView and there are limitations: Refer to LV_ChildWnd.vi for details.

[mikeporter]

What is the advantages of creating a child window in this manner? It seems to me that it's a lot easier to simply create one as a standalone window that is linked to the "parent".

Mike...

[MichelC]

Well, in my opinion, child windows offer many advantages; this is probably why Windows and most commercial software support them...

Here are a few advantages:

- You can design single window applications. It makes things clearer when you need to have many others opened at the same time.

- You don't have to manage the parent - client dependencies by yourself; when you close/../move/max-min-imize the parent, the child windows are closed/../moved/max-mini-mized too.

- You can use them to include additional menu bars in one front panel.

- You can design floating toolbars attached to a specific window.

- You can split a complex front panels into multiple sub Vis, programmatically combine their front panels, and design elaborate interactive / conf
igurable GUIs.

The most obvious advantage is with IMAQ windows that are standalone by default. It is very convenient to to display them as indicators in a front panel instead of having them scattered on the screen and always overlapped by other windows.

I do not understand why NI does not support child windows in LabView, especially since they had to create one using the same technique to design the 'IMAQ Vision Builder' GUI (the main image display is a IMAQ child window without a title bar).

MichelC.

[x]

No flickering if you use G Toolbox/Set Parent Plus.



MichelC wrote:
> This is a variation of the "SetParent()" method.
>
> It allows a cleaner creation of child windows Vis (less flickering and
> it also lets you define their initial location inside the parent
> window; the other method is very bad in that regard).
>
> Both techniques consist in tricking LabView and there are limitations:
> Refer to LV_ChildWnd.vi for details.

[MichelC]

Ver.2