Need help with GUI validation problem...

[Thresher]

I have a dialog box with a tree control and 10 edit boxes that hold strings. (The strings represent floats & ints in the underlying data). Items on the Treecontrol(1,2... n) has 10 edit boxes. The users click on the tree control to see the next item with it's edit boxes of data. My problem is this: Say for example, EditBox1 can hold a number, 0-600 only. The user enters a digit... I first tried using OnChangeEdit1 so everytime data changed in the box I'd validate it... but I ran into a problem when a user was entering data I was checking it EVERY digit entered into the box. So I tried to check it in OnKillFocusEdit1, but I noticed that when I clicked on the treecontrol from the EditBox1, that EditBox1 for the previous item was no longer in focus but eEditBox1 for the newly clicked on item WS in foucs so that's the data I got. Like the KillFocus couldn't happen fast enough. Can anybody help me please...?

Thank you.

[phone_guy]

"...So I tried to check it in OnKillFocusEdit1, but I noticed that when I clicked on the treecontrol from the EditBox1, that EditBox1 for the previous item was no longer in focus but eEditBox1 for the newly clicked on item WS in foucs so that's the data I got."

I'm with you up to this point. But could you explain this a little more clearly?

[GCDEF]

Maybe use your EN_CHANGE notification to record which edit control was the last changed, then do your validation based on that.

[wayside]

What's wrong with validating the control contents after every key press?

That lets you filter out all non-numeric characters, and never allow the user to enter a number bigger or smaller than you want, before the text box gets updated.

It's a very nice way to do things, actually, because then it is impossible for the user to enter an invalid amount. It can save a lot of validation work down the line, if you have many functions which might have to validate the values.

[GCDEF]

Originally posted by wayside
What's wrong with validating the control contents after every key press?

That lets you filter out all non-numeric characters, and never allow the user to enter a number bigger or smaller than you want, before the text box gets updated.

It's a very nice way to do things, actually, because then it is impossible for the user to enter an invalid amount. It can save a lot of validation work down the line, if you have many functions which might have to validate the values.

It has its limitations. If a certain number of characters is required, and the user has entered too many or too few but is not yet finished entering data, what do you do? It's good for only allowing certain characters, but not necessarily for general validation of data.

[Thresher]

Originally posted by phone_guy
"...So I tried to check it in OnKillFocusEdit1, but I noticed that when I clicked on the treecontrol from the EditBox1, that EditBox1 for the previous item was no longer in focus but eEditBox1 for the newly clicked on item WS in foucs so that's the data I got."

I'm with you up to this point. But could you explain this a little more clearly?

OK... I'll try. When a user has items expanded in the treecontrol...say Item1 & Item2 and in the focus is in EditBox#3 on the dialog....say I just entered a "100" in EditBox#3 for Item1 in the dialog, when I click from EditBox#3 to inside the treecontrol on Item2, the OnKillFocus for EditBox#3 is called but.. it sees the data of EditBox#3 for Item2 and NOT Item1!! I thought OnKillFocus would be ideal but by the time it is called it's got the wrong data. I only have this problem when clicking from one of the many editboxes to the treecontrol... not from editbox to editbox. I hope this makes more sense.... I don't know if I'm explaining it well enough. Thanks for the help..

[TDM]

Is using ES_NUMBER an option (are you just trying to make sure each only has numbers)? Is using DDV an option?

TDM

[phone_guy]

I think what is happening is your TreeView is recognizing the click and retrieving the data for the selected item before it receives the focus.

I believe what you need to do here is write a message handler for the TVN_SELCHANGING notification message in your TreeView control. This will fire when you switch between item selections, but before the selection changes. In this function, call UpdateData(true). This will call the DoDataExchange() function in your Dialog Box. You can then set Data Validation rules to make sure the data is acceptable. Look here:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/de...validation.asp

[Thresher]

Originally posted by phone_guy
I think what is happening is your TreeView is recognizing the click and retrieving the data for the selected item before it receives the focus.

I believe what you need to do here is write a message handler for the TVN_SELCHANGING notification message in your TreeView control. This will fire when you switch between item selections, but before the selection changes. In this function, call UpdateData(true). This will call the DoDataExchange() function in your Dialog Box. You can then set Data Validation rules to make sure the data is acceptable. Look here:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/de...validation.asp

This might be what I need! I'll check it out. Thanks!