Manipulating the Control Panel

Description

When you write an application for others to use, you will typically want to hide the standard Alpha Anywhere Control Panel. To do this, create a Global Script called "Autoexec". This script should execute the following Xbasic command:

:controlpanel.hide()

On your application main menu, you might want to have an Exit button that ends the application, without quitting Alpha Anywhere. This script would execute the following Xbasic command:

:controlpanel.show()

To have your Exit button end Alpha Anywhere, you would use this command:

:A5.CLOSE()

Alpha Anywhere supports the following methods for controlling the Control Panel :

Method: Description
CONTROLPANEL.HIDE(): Hide the Control Panel
CONTROLPANEL.SHOW(): Show the Control Panel
CONTROLPANEL.MAXIMIZE(): Maximize the Control Panel
CONTROLPANEL.MINIMIZE(): Minimize the Control Panel
CONTROLPANEL.RESTORE(): Restore the Control Panel

The CONTROLPANEL.MAXIMIZE() method allows you to start up Alpha Anywhere in maximized mode by creating an autoexec script whose first line is :ControlPanel.Maximize(). This is useful for creating the appearance of a "single frame" application, and eliminating the characteristic space left around a non-maximized window.