I really almos do not use menus. I mean, the main menu of the application was made using the gui 15 years ago and we have added 1 or 2 new options in the meantime :)
Menus do not change frequently in general in any application, but, of course, it depends on the application.
If your menus change frequently, then I suggest using an objetized menu. I remember a project that did that, but do not remember the name of if.
I see at least two options that may work in your case:
1) Using "OOP menu project" (that's the name, found in VFPx), on which you can change options by programming
2) Using FoxBin2Prg for merging options and procedures between different menus and regenerating the binary, so you can edit it again anytime using the IDE
A 3rd option could be manually editing/adding differences between menus using the VFP IDE, but it is costly.
At the beginning I sugested FoxBin2Prg because you mention "comparing", and there is not visual tool (Menu-editor style) available AFAIK.
There are many options available, depending on what to you need.
Regards.-
2016-06-16 19:49 GMT+02:00 Richard Kaye rkaye@invaluable.com:
Ah. So you're not essentially using the GUI for menu design? I agree that if you take the MNX out of the equation it becomes a much simpler problem, especially if the tools create nice clean PRGs as opposed to the MNA/MPR style code.
Thanks again for the suggestion and engaging in the conversation. : -)
--
rk
-----Original Message----- From: ProfoxTech [mailto:profoxtech-bounces@leafe.com] On Behalf Of Fernando D. Bozzo Sent: Thursday, June 16, 2016 1:27 PM To: profoxtech@leafe.com Subject: Re: VFP menu documentation utility?
Well, I think that you can see it by yourself. Downloading and making a quick test is faster than the time required to write an email.
We have 2 independent/distributed teams working with VFP 9 projects with more than 1.5 millon lines of code between forms, classlibs, menus and prgs on a DVCS system (PlasticSCM) sharing, branching and merging code since mid 2014, and I can say that FoxBin2Prg was the only tool that not only allow merging, but do it showing PRG-style code to the Developer, which is what we know better. No XML (excect in table data and reports), no "rare" text.
Forms, Classlibs and Menus are converted to PRG-style, and in 2+ years we didn't have any problems when merging and regenerating operative binaries.
I think that having at least 2 VFPx projects oriented to git ("bin2text" from Lutz Sheffler and "git utils" from Mike Potjer) and even FoxUnit using it as the bin*text conversor gives some confidence about it.
But, again, the only way to know if it's for you is doing a test with a copy of your files.
2016-06-16 19:01 GMT+02:00 Richard Kaye rkaye@invaluable.com:
Good points about the modify & merge, etc. Having said that, VFP menu metadata is even odder than SCX/VCXs so I'm not quite sure if the ability to regenerate the DBF (MNX) would create a functional menu. But just like using Rich Schumer's HackCX tool, it could come in handy using your very fine tools.
Just to make it (hopefully) a little more clear, let's say I have 2 or more menus and they are mostly the same. My idea was to be able to look
at
each BAR and see how many PADs are on each bar, perhaps even compare the commands or procedure code so I know which items need to be added to or deprecated from my new master menu.
--
rk
-----Original Message----- From: ProfoxTech [mailto:profoxtech-bounces@leafe.com] On Behalf Of Fernando D. Bozzo Sent: Thursday, June 16, 2016 12:13 PM To: profoxtech@leafe.com Subject: Re: VFP menu documentation utility?
Hi Richard,
I may do not understand well what you need exactly.
With scctextx you can only "compare" (readonly), while with foxbin2prg
you
can "compare, modify the text or merge and regenerate the binary", which scctextx can't do.
But, if you preffer to do it with programming, then that's ok. You
started
asking for a way of comparing options, and this is one way to do it with merging capabilities, like in git.
Regards.-
2016-06-16 16:52 GMT+02:00 Richard Kaye rkaye@invaluable.com:
Thanks, Fernando. I pretty much have something similar going with
SCCTEXTX
and my diffing tool of choice. I'm sure your utils are a bit more
elegant
but I'm in get it done mode at the moment. : - )
What I was thinking of writing was a bit more menu specific using
things
like PRMPAD() and CNTPAD() etc. Dump stuff into arrays, parse them out
and
comp the results.
--
rk
-----Original Message----- From: ProfoxTech [mailto:profoxtech-bounces@leafe.com] On Behalf Of Fernando D. Bozzo Sent: Thursday, June 16, 2016 10:18 AM To: profoxtech@leafe.com Subject: Re: VFP menu documentation utility?
If you want to compare menus, then you can use FoxBin2Prg to convert
them
to Text (.MN2) and compare using a good tool like Meld, Beyond Compare, WinMerge or any other.
With FoxBin2Prg there is a utility included called FB2P_DIFF.exe, which allows you to just run it and drag & drop your menus (MNX) to the input filename boxes to do a quick compare using WinMerge Portable (also included) without the need to setup anything else. Inside FB2P_DIFF.exe
you
can configure other DIFF utils (it have Beyond Compare v2 preconfigured too, in case you have it installed)
You can download from VFPx: https://vfpx.codeplex.com/wikipage?title=FoxBin2prg
Try it and comment here about if was useful to you,
Best Regards.-
2016-06-16 16:06 GMT+02:00 Richard Kaye rkaye@invaluable.com:
I have some similar menus and I'm looking for a way to tell which
menu
options might be unique to one or the other so I can build a single consolidated menu.
I've already forged ahead by diffing MPR/MNAs. It's a bit noisy as
VFP
assigns sys(2015) values to each proc so there are a lot of
irrelevant
differences to wade through. But I'm impatient... : - )
--
rk -----Original Message----- From: ProfoxTech [mailto:profoxtech-bounces@leafe.com] On Behalf Of Fernando D. Bozzo Sent: Thursday, June 16, 2016 9:40 AM To: profoxtech@leafe.com Subject: Re: VFP menu documentation utility?
Hi Richard:
You want to compare VFP menus to what exactly? to older versions?
2016-06-16 15:05 GMT+02:00 Richard Kaye rkaye@invaluable.com:
I want to compare some VFP menus; bars, pads, etc. I know there
are a
number of native functions I can string together to do this but
before
I
reinvent the wheel I thought I'd check with the collective wisdom
to
see
if
anyone here has already built my utility for me. : - )
TIA
--
rk
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