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package bmsi.edx.fs

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  • DBField
  • DBTable
  • FSClock
  • FSComp
  • FSDate
  • FSGrid
  • FSLtr
  • FSNum
  • FSPager
  • FSPanel
  • FSString
  • FSTextArea
  • PFKeyEvent
  • PFMap
    •   Interfaces
  • PFKeyListener

    • EDX Full Screen Application Library

    by Stuart D. Gathman
    Last updated Nov 02, 2000

    Overall Design Goals

    Seamless EDX/Java Integration

    While a TUI AWT implementation can be used for the user interface to Java applications with EDX/UNX, our users are confused by user interface changes. For instance, the tab order on 4978 screens is always by physical location. In Java AWT, whether TUI or GUI, it is defined by the application within each AWT container. With multiple frames and panels, the result seems illogical to a user expecting physical tab order.

    Our solution is to give Java programs access to the emulated EDX 4978 terminals. The basic operations (read/write the screen and waitkey) are provided by the EDX4978 class. The terminal user cannot tell whether EDL or Java or a mixture is controlling the screen.

    High Level Application Framework

    Programming BMS applications in EDL is efficient despite the primitive language because of the high level event driven framework provided by the BMS library. The EDL library has 2 principal layers:

    The FS layer displays stored screen designs and provides screen reading/writing and cursor positioning by field. Fields are sequentially numbered unprotected (input) areas.

    The FCB (Field Control Block) layer groups the fields into logical sections and distributes pfkey events to the appropriate FCB based on the cursor position. An FCB may also be configured as a scrolling table or grid.

    This package aims to be a Java version of the FS/FCB library. We cannot, of course, resist attempting to improve it in the translation.

    Migration path to Swing/AWT

    The public API should also be implemented with a GUI client. Both 4978 and GUI clients should be able to operate with the same application server JVM.

    Overview

    The FSPanel class represents an EDX screen. Only one FSPanel may be active at a time, but multiple instances may be kept for rapid switching between screens. An FSPanel may be initialized programmatically, or from a stored image. An FSPanel may define 0 or more unprotected data input fields which are numbered sequentially from 0. Fields are added automatically from stored images, or manually with the addField() method.

    FSComp is an abstract base class for the equivalent of an FCB. Derived classes implement tables, groups of fields and other specializations. FSPanel is itself an FSComp. An FSComp must be added to an FSPanel to be active.

    The FSPanel.fprocess() method reads PFKeyEvents and sends them to the appropriate FSComp based on the row and column at which the event occured. Changes to data input fields are also detected and signaled with the special PFKeyEvent.FIELD_MODIFIED pfkey.

    The FSTextArea class provides a scrollable and editable text area which is available to the application as a String[]. The DBField class links a screen field to a database field. The FSGrid class forms the base of components that deal with multi line controls, for example FSTextArea. DBTable links a scrollable and editable multi line table to a database table.

    BUGS

    Send comments to Stuart D. Gathman.
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