getPropertyDescriptionList --> pass a variable instead of concrete value?

[Christian Grass]

Hi Folks!

I have the following code within a behaviour:

-----------------------------------------
on getPropertyDescriptionList
pList = [:]
pList.addProp(#pListBox,[#default:VOID, #format:#object,
#comment:"Global Reference to a Listbox Object:"])
pList.addProp(#pItemList,[#default:VOID, #format:#list,
#comment:"Itemlist:"])
return pList
end

----------------------------------------

And in my movie script:

gListBox = script("listbox").new()
gUserList = getUsers()

----------------------------------------

When the according dialog appears by dragging the behaviour on a sprite:
Then I want to type "gListBox" into the property field for "#pListBox",
and "gUserList" for "#pItemList".

Unfortunately those variables are not taken as variables and my code can't
work.
How can I make Lingo consider it as a variable or the value of the
variable? I guess, I have to do some kind of type conversion?

[Christian Grass]

I am happy that I finally was able to solve this.

Don't ask me why this is working. I just had a bunch of ideas how it might
work and found out by trial & error.
The point was that I had to give it as objects and then pull out the
references by using the keyword "value".

Now, I would be pleased to get also logically behind this. I understand it
to some extent, but I am missing the final enlightenment, because I
couldn't find this documented in any macromedia technote or somewhere else.



Here's the code:
----------------

on getPropertyDescriptionList
pList = [:]
pList.addProp(#pListBox,[#default: void, #format:#object,
#comment:"Listbox Object:"])
pList.addProp(#pItemList,[#default: void, #format:#object,
#comment:"Itemlist:"])
return pList
end


on beginSprite me

pItemList = pItemList.value
pListBox = pListBox.value

....

[Andrew Morton]

Director doesn't know that you are putting a variable name in as a property so
you have to use value() to interpret the string as a variable name. Fortunately,
using value that way avoids the pitfalls encountered if a list has a void value
or a quote inside a string:

x=[void, 1 , "ab" & quote & "c"]
put value("x")
-- [<Void>, 1, "ab"c"]
s=string(value(x))
put s
-- "[<Void>, 1, "ab"c"]"
y=value(s)
put y
-- <Void>

This may give you some ideas:

-- Welcome to Director --
a=123
b="hello"
put (the globals)[#a]
-- 123
varname="b"
put (the globals)[symbol(varname)]
-- "hello"

Andrew

[Christian Grass]

thank you!

[Christian Grass]

thank you!