I have yet to find a way to use a slider to change the contents of a dialog box, but that is EXACTLY what I want to do. If anyone here knows how to do that, it would be great to hear. Thanks!
I don't want to go out on a limb and say it's not possible because I've seen some pretty slick programming here in the forum, but I'm 99% sure it's not possible. Maybe you can regroup your info into a list or some other form that allows it to be displayed but also be edited. I think you have tried to make the tiles act as data instead of them displaying your data.
Could you explain a bit more about the interaction between the prints and the layers that are listed below the prints?
This would help to think about an alternative way of displaying everything.
The layers essentially are the prints. There are a whole host of layers that are on for every print (Architecture, Annotation, Hang Schedule, etc.). Each print turns on the scenery for a different layer (or multiple scenes depending on the nature of the print). So in the example below, you get a plan for 11scene, a section for 11scene, a plan for 12 scene, and you get scene 21 and 31 on the same printout so that gets two layer names. The dropdown menus fill themselves with all of the layers named "*-Scenery_Layout".
I've reread your first post as well to get a good concept of what you are trying to achive. What I've understood is that you would like to create a dialog to help ease the creation of print sheets. The list should be visible on the dialog for those creating the list. I would say the dialog should create an association list of information and be shown on the dialog. This association list could be listed like this (pseudo code):
PRINT-LIST is the name of your print list. (Which you can name something else to fit)
PRINT-SCENE is the atom representing the main print sheet.
ADDITIONAL-SCENE is a list of additional layers to the scene. This list could be empty (NIL) or contain as many additional layers as needed.
INT-PRINT-STATUS is the atom from the type of print. Either Plan or Section. Data entered here is either 0 or 1 and can't be NIL.
As far as the dialog box is concerned, I would show a text box showing the currect state of the print list. Adding, deleting or rearranging sheets can be done with buttons on the dialog like you have now. The association list should be the one piece of information which is to be used for displaying and printing of the sheets. User interaction with the dialog should rewrite the list accordingly. With this list you can extract the information quite easily.
I think this idea could work, and I've already got the code set up to write association lists for each print.
In this situation, do you have any thoughts about how to modify the contents of the list? Should that be a second dialog box that opens via another button?
I think you could get away with all the functionality on one dialog. The actual print list displayed at the bottom and buttons for adding, deleting and rearranging at the top.
Glad to help. When making dialogs you always have to think of the person using it and if it makes sense. Plus you don't want to program yourself into a dead end. I feel using an association list for the data gives you a lot of possibilities to reuse the information. You can write little tools to populate a list or to extract info and reformat into a text to create a report. Endless possibilities...
