C + + Builder IDE Usage tips

No matter how long you've been using the C++builder, there's no doubt that the IDE has some features that you ignore. This article describes some of the less-known features of the IDE.

Quick Select Form

When you develop an application, you often need to select a form to change the property value of the form or to generate a new form event handle. Sometimes, selecting a page simply clicks on the page. But most of the time, the page is always completely hidden by the components on it.

Selecting from the Drop-down combo box at the top of the object Observer (objects Inspector) is a workaround. However, it is not easy to find the form class from the Drop-down list, especially if the page contains a large number of components.

Fortunately, the IDE provides shortcut keys for selecting form. For example, when a memo component fills the client area of the form in a client-aligned manner. To select a form, you can select form by simply clicking on the memo and then pressing the ESC key.

In fact, the IDE shifts focus to the parent object of the originally selected object. If you place another component on the panel panel on the form, the Panel panel is selected when you click the component and then press the ESC key. When you press the ESC key, the form is selected.

Check the components in the container (container)

The panel panel is often used as a container for other components. You might want to also select several components on the panel to move them or change their common properties. You can, of course, select these components by shift+ click. But if you want to choose by dragging your mouse, you will only drag the panel around. Hold down the CTRL key and drag, and it's completely different. This approach applies to all container-class components (GroupBox, Scrollbox, ControlBar, etc.).

Fine tune

Most of the time, you will make subtle adjustments to the components on the form. When you select a component, hold down the CTRL key and then press the arrow key (four arrows) to move the component in the corresponding direction in pixels. Hold down the SHIFT and CTRL keys while you press the arrow keys to move the component to the next grid anchor point.

To extend or shorten a pixel by the component to the appropriate side, hold down the SHIFT key and press the direction key. Around the key to adjust the width of the component, the upper and lower keys to adjust the assembly height.

Change the properties of several components at the same time

When you select more than one component, the object Observer (objects Inspector) Displays the common attributes of those components. For example, if you want several edit components in a form to have the same width, simply select them at the same time, and then change the Width property in the object Viewer, and all of the component widths you select will become the new width values. This is also a convenient way to empty the Text property of many edit components at once.

Use the Alignment (Alignment) dialog box!

You often need to make sure that a set of components can be aligned in some way. For example, you want an edit component to align with the middle of its corresponding label component. Select the edit component, then Shift-Select the label component, right-click on one of the components, and choose the Align (alignment) option on the pop-up menu. A alignment dialog box pops up, allowing you to align the components in some order. It's simple, try it.

I must point out that this is just one aspect of using the Alignment dialog box, which is actually the principle of component anchoring (anchor). The first component of a set of components that you select will be the anchor component. That is, the anchor component does not move, and all other components are aligned to him in alignment.

The last thing to say is, View | The Alignment palette is exactly the same as the Alignment dialog box.

Conclusion

For some readers, the content of this article is very ridiculous! But I'm betting that most people can learn a lot from this article that you haven't noticed before. C++builder's rad features are impressive. This will be especially true once you learn to use the IDE to its fullest.