Show box on top, keep dialog onscreen

[User_McUser]

I have a custom dialog and I want it to stay visible on-screen while the script runs. The script takes a while to run so I want a place to show progress updates to the user while they wait. A box seems like an easy way to do this but the box always appears *behind* (z-order) the dialog. I tried calling "WinActivate" using the box's caption but that did not work.

What mojo is needed to move the Box to be above (z-order) the dialog?

Thanks! 😀

[td]

Not sure that it will work, but have you tried the WindowOnTop function?

WindowOnTop

[User_McUser]

Thank you for the suggestion; unfortunately this did not work. 🙁

The overall script is used to query user profiles on a PC so we can reclaim disk space. The subroutine with the Box calls is below in case I made an obvious mistake. It is invoked from the @dePbPush callback for the main dialog.

Code Select Expand

#DefineSubRoutine getComputerInfo(getSize)

	theFolders = Arrayize(DirItemize("%theBasePath%*.*"), @TAB)
	theLength = ArrInfo(theFolders, 1) - 1
	
	if theLength < 0 then
		Message("ERROR", "Could not get folder list from %theBasePath%%@CRLF%%@CRLF%Make sure you have Admin permissions on the target device.")
		return 0
	endif
	
	profileCount = 0
	profileList = ""
	
	for i = 0 to theLength
		username = theFolders[i]
		if StrCmp(StrLower(username), "administrator") == 0 then next
		if StrCmp(StrLower(username), "defaultapppool") == 0 then next
		if StrCmp(StrLower(username), "public") == 0 then next
		if StrCmp(StrLower(username), "default") == 0 then next
		if StrCmp(StrLower(username), "defaultuser0") == 0 then next
		if StrCmp(StrLower(username), "all users") == 0 then next
		profileCount += 1
		profileList = ItemInsert(username, -1, profileList, @TAB)
	endfor
	
	tempArray = Arrayize(profileList, @TAB)
	profileArray = ArrDimension(profileCount+1,6)

	if profileCount == 0 then
		Message("No Profiles Found", "Something went terribly wrong - didn't find any folders in %theBasePath%")
		exit
	endif

	profileArray[0,0] = "Checkbox"
	profileArray[0,1] = "Username"
	profileArray[0,2] = "Account AD Status"
	profileArray[0,3] = "Profile Size (GB)"
	profileArray[0,4] = "Last Login"
	profileArray[0,5] = "Profile Path"

	if getSize == @TRUE then
		BoxeNew(1, "0,0,200,200", 2)
		BoxCaption(1, "Calculating Profile Sizes")
		BoxDataTag(1, "theDataTag")
		BoxesUp("400,400,600,600", @normal)
		WinActivate("Calculating Profile Sizes")
	endif

	tempVar = ArrInfo(tempArray, 1) - 1
	tempCount = tempVar + 1

	for i = 0 to tempVar
		k = i + 1
		tempName = tempArray[i]
		if getSize == @TRUE then
			BoxDataClear(1, "theDataTag")
			BoxDrawText(1, "0,50,1000,150", "Calculating profile sizes, please wait.", @TRUE, 1)
			BoxDrawText(1, "0,200,1000,500", "Processing profile %k% of %tempCount% - Please wait.", @TRUE, 5)
			BoxDrawText(1, "0,500,1000,1000", StrCat(theBasePath, tempName), @TRUE, 1)
		endif
		tempArray2 =  getProfileInfo(theBasePath, tempName, theDC, getSize)
		for j = 0 to 5
			profileArray[k,j] = tempArray2[j]
		endfor
	endfor

	if getSize == @TRUE then
		WinActivate("Calculating Profile Sizes") ;Without this line, the BoxDestroy below does NOT remove the box.
		BoxDestroy(1)
	endif

#EndSubRoutine

[td]

As a side note, you may need to use DialogProcOptions @dpoDisable option." If you have code that may take a long time to execute in a callback, you may need to temporarily disable the dialog. Don't forget to enable after the process is complete."

More towards your immediate issue, why not use a control on your dialog to display the status as you process?

[User_McUser]

Yeah, that is an option (using a control on the dialog.) Honestly? I like the aesthetics of the pop-over box more than embedding it into the dialog but that might be how I need to go. 🤷 Or maybe I will use a second custom dialog - the box routines seemed quicker at the time. I'll figure something out.

I flirted with using WinPlaceSet to move the box on the y-axis to be just above or below the main dialog but I don't like the way that looks. (Aside: Could we eventually get a WB function similar to WinPlaceSet but for z-order? Admittedly, I don't know much about how Windows does z-order other than there is one so maybe this is more of an ask than I realize. 🤔)

BTW - @dpoDisable did not change the behavior but I appreciate the suggestion; not something I was thinking about.

Thanks as always! 😀

[td]

WindowOnTop places a window on the top of the z-order and you need to use @dpoDisable to have the dialog still receive window messages if your callback is doing length processing. If you don't, the OS will think the process is hung.

[td]

To add context, the WinBatch main window owns WIL dialog windows. I won't go into the details, but it is why you shouldn't use WinBatch boxes in WIL dialog procedures in the same process.