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Icons In Menus 2 - Create Unlimited Popup Menus
 Download the cNewMenu ActiveX DLL (55kb)
Download the cNewMenu demonstration project (46kb)
Download the cNewMenu demonstration project and component source code (175kb)
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 Updated! 30 May 1999
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This DLL (version 2.00.0011) now supports CoolMenu applications
in conjunction with the vbAccelerator CoolMenu Toolbar and Rebar control.
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Accelerators now work. When you add a menu item, if you specify an Accelerator in the caption,
for example, "&Home" & vbTab & "Alt+Home", then the control will intercept it and raise a Click
event.
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New eye candy - a bitmap can be tiled into the background of the menu and there is a new
GradientHighlight property (as demonstrated in the picture above).
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Check box images can now be automatically drawn using the system standard check marks rather
than an ImageList icons. In addition, Options Box style check marks are now also supported.
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Bug fix - now the Click event fires whenever a menu item is clicked.
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Updated! 27 January 1999
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A horrible bug has been fixed. This caused menus to get
corrupted when using quite a few sub-menus - sub-menus would move to new positions, items
would swap into the wrong menu... Thanks to David Isham for pointing out this bug and
helping me with code to test it out.
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Now Menu Items can be set to Owner-Draw style. This raises an event to the client and
allows the client to draw part or all of the menu item.
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Menu breaks are now supported in the same way as the Icon Menu control (i.e. prefixing the
caption with a pipe ("|") will cause a menu break with a column divider at that menu item, prefixing it
with a hat ("^") will cause a menu break without a column divider.)
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New Header property causes a menu item to be drawn as an ICQ-style separator with text. The Header style can
also draw like a caption for a more modern effect.
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Setting the Default property for a menu item causes it to be drawn in bold font.
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Source Code Note
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This DLL is a binary compatible component which works with all other samples.
If you compile your own copy of this DLL yourself please make sure you change
the name. See disclaimer and license for more details.
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Before you Begin
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These projects require the SSubTmr.DLL component. Make sure you have loaded and registered this before trying any project.
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Overview
The cNewMenu ActiveX DLL is a companion to the cPopMenu control. cPopMenu
allow you to subclass an existing form's VB menus and add icons and Office 97 style menu
drawing. cNewMenu does the same, but instead of subclassing existing menus it allows you
to create as many new popup menus as you want. You can store the popup menus within the control
so you can swap between them at any point. Even better than that, your popup menus can have
an unrestricted number of sub-popup menus (well, at least until you run out of screen space!) and
you can dynamically build the sub menus in just the same way as the cPopMenu control.
 Click here to view the cNewMenu.DLL method and event documentation
Quick Start - Using the cNewMenu DLL
Here is how to get cNewMenu working in your project quickly:
- Add a reference to the cNewMenu DLL to your project (it appears as "vbAccelerator Popup Menu DLL - Allows an umlimited number
of new pop-up menus to be created without reference to a VB menu" in the References list.)
If you don't already have an ImageList, add one with the icons you want.
- Initialise an instance of the cPopupMenu class in a form you want the popup menus to appear.
You can either make the instance visible to the entire form, in which case you can respond to
cPopupMenu events such as ItemHighlight and InitPopupMenu, or you can declare it at the point you
need it.
- To declare the instance with event handling:
Private WithEvents m_cPopMenu as cPopMenu
Private Sub Form_Load()
    Set m_cPopMenu = New cPopupMenu
    ' Initialise the Image List (you can change this later):
    m_cPopMenu.ImageList = ilsIcons16
    ' Initialise the hWndOwner (you must do this before showing a menu):
    m_cPopMenu.hWndOwner = Me.hWnd
End Sub
To declare the instance when you need it:
Private Sub txtEdit_MouseDown(Button As Integer, Shift As Integer, X As Single, Y As Single)
    Dim cPopMenu As New cPopupMenu
    ' Initialise the Image List:
    cPopMenu.ImageList = ilsIcons16
    ' Initialise the hWndOwner (you must do this before showing a menu):
    cPopMenu.hWndOwner = Me.hWnd
End Sub
Now you are in a position to create some menus. This sample shows you how to
add a (vaguely familiar?) menu which looks like this:
Cut
Copy
Paste
_____________
Toggle >
 Breakpoint
______________________
 Break on All Errors
Break in Class Module
Break on Unhandled Errors
______________________
Bookmark
_____________
Object Browser
Dim lIndex As Long
Dim lIconIndex As Long
    ' Here I am assuming the Image List is called ilsIcons and
    ' the PopMenu object is cP:
    ' Add Cut/Copy/Paste:
    lIconIndex = ilsIcons.ListImages("CUT").Index - 1
    cP.AddItem "Cu&t", , , , lIconIndex, , , "Cut"
    lIconIndex = ilsIcons.ListImages("COPY").Index - 1
    cP.AddItem "&Copy", , , , lIconIndex, , , "Copy"
    lIconIndex = ilsIcons.ListImages("PASTE").Index - 1
    ' The Paste item is disabled here:
    cP.AddItem "&Paste", , , , lIconIndex, False, , "Paste"
    cP.AddItem "-"
    ' Add Toggle and Store the Index so we can add sub items to it:
    lIndex = cP.AddItem("&Toggle")
        ' Add the Sub Items:
        lIconIndex = ilsIcons.ListImages("BREAKPOINT").Index - 1
        cP.AddItem "Breakpoint", , ,lIndex , lIconIndex, , , "Breakpoint"
        cP.AddItem "-", , ,lIndex
        ' This item is checked:
        cP.AddItem "Break on All Errors", , ,lIndex , , , True, "BreakAll"
        cP.AddItem "Break in Class Module", , ,lIndex , , , , "BreakClass"
        cP.AddItem "Break on Unhandled Errors", , ,lIndex , , , , "BreakUnhandled"
        cP.AddItem "-", , ,lIndex
        lIconIndex = ilsIcons.ListImages("BOOKMARK").Index - 1
        cP.AddItem "Bookmark", , ,lIndex , , , , "Bookmark"
    cP.AddItem "-"
    lIconIndex = ilsIcons.ListImages("OBJECTBROWSER").Index - 1
    cP.AddItem "&Object Browser", , , , lIconIndex, False, , "ObjBrowser"
Having built a menu, you can now show it. Note that if your PopMenu instance is
visible for the entire form, you can store this menu for later use under a string key of
your choice using cP.Store "YourName". To get it back again, just call cP.Restore "YourName".
To show the menu, you need to determine the left and right positions to show it, and you
can optionally provide the boundaries of a rectangle in which the menu must not appear. This
rectangle is useful if you are showing the menu as the result of clicking a button, when you
don't want the button to be obscured by the menu:
    ' Show the menu and get the index the user chooses (if any):
    ' For this sample, it is assumed the menu is been shown because
    ' the button cmdNewMenu has been clicked:
    lIndex = cP.ShowPopupMenu( _
        cmdNewMenu.Left, cmdNewMenu.Top + cmdNewMenu.Height, _
        cmdNewMenu.Left, cmdNewMenu.Top, _
        cmdNewMenu.Left + cmdNewMenu.Width, cmdNewMenu.Top + cmdNewMenu.Height _
        )
    If (iIndex > 0) Then
        ' Display the key of the chosen item:
        MsgBox "Selected: " & cP.ItemKey(iIndex)
    End If
Note that the coordinates to exclude should be specified relative to the form which owns
the instance of the cPopupMenu class (specified through the hWndOwner property when
you initialise the class).
You can do more sophisticated things by responding to the ItemHighlight
and MenuExit events to provide status messages. You can also respond to the
InitPopupMenuMenu event if you want to dynamically create sub items just as they are
about to be shown. Check
the cPopMenu control for more details on these methods.
Text Separators
The new text separator feature can be used by either setting the Header property to
true for the menu item, or by prefixing the item's caption with a minus when it is added:
    cP.AddItem "-Other Sites", , , , lIconIndex
There are two styles for text separators, set using the HeaderStyle property:
-
ecnmHeaderCaptionBar
This is the default, and renders like a small caption bar:
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ecnmHeaderSeparator
In this style the separator renders in the ICQ style:
Although the small caption style headers look a little like the tear off bars you get
in Office, there is no way to allow a menu to be torn off like a dialog control.
vbAccelerator is working on an Office 97 style tear-off drop-down control, but this will
be based on a VB Form rather than a Menu.
Owner-Draw Menus
Each menu item added can now be made to raise an event whenever it is about to be measured
or drawn by
setting the OwnerDraw property to True for that item. Having done this, you
can then create completely customised menu items with your own style of caption.
Check out the supporting samples to see how this works:
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 Back to Source Code
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