[news.eclipse.platform.swt] Re: Hosting SWT windows inside a WIN32 app

[rickkhunter@xxxxxxxxxxx (Yannick Grosjean)]

Actually it is what I'm trying to do. Let me give some more details. The 
current application is built using a development tool called NatStar which 
has it's own wrapper over windows API. It is designed for N-tier apps and 
generates C code for the target platform. We use it on windows so it is 
rougly the same as talking about a C MDI App.

Using a DLL in C and JNI, we are able to create SWT java windows. Since 
constructing a composite requires a parent composite, I guess this is 
where some of the low level hacking occurs?  From what I get of your last 
post, it seems to we it would be a lot of pain to get this to work? I 
don't suppose it's been done before?


Steve Northover wrote:

> Windows MDI is a real mess, even for C programmers.  MDI is not supported by
> SWT because it only occurs on Windows and is not portable.

> If you really need Windows MDI, you might be better off leaving that part in
> C and embedding SWT composites inside C based MDI parents.  This may require
> modifications to the SWT event loop and other low level hacks to the toolkit
> to get it to work.

> "Yannick Grosjean" <rickkhunter@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
> news:9bc963ed116964571994583f4d96c228$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > actually I was indeed meanin MDI Child... I've been trying this morning
> > with decorations since they are said to be providing the functionality of
> > shells without being top windows, alas, without too much success.
> >
> > Another way to put my problem would be to picture a very large WIN32 MDI
> > application, with many types of MDI Children, that I want to gradually
> > replace with SWT children, ultimately creating an MDI parent in SWT
> >
> > Steve Northover wrote:
> >
> > > Yes, if you mean "dialog child", then use the constructor "new Shell
> > > (Shell)".  If you mean "MDI child", then this is not supported in SWT.
> >
> > > I'm not sure what the original problem is.  It should be easy enough to
> mix
> > > SWT and native code.  Can you give a better description, or even better,
> > > some I can run code?
> >
> > > "Yannick Grosjean" <rickkhunter@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
> > > news:faaeedb3bcfbe1d1697ab6254a5cb47e$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > >> Here's an interresting challenge.
> > >>
> > >> As part of the migration process of porting our application from win32
> to
> > >> java/SWT, it is a requierement that the migration be done
> progressively.
> > >> In other words, the main window of the application will remain  win32
> > >> while we gradually re-write the child windows with SWT.
> > >>
> > >> Our current approach is to contain SWT shells by first creating them,
> then
> > >> using their window handles and the SetParent WIN32 function to attach
> them
> > >> to our application. So far all seemed well but when the newly created
> SWT
> > >> window has the focus, the main window loses it.
> > >>
> > >> From what I can tell, it's because the Shell object is by default
> created
> > >> as a main window. My question is this, is there a way to create a SWT
> > >> shell that would be a child to a WIN32 main window?
> > >>
> > >> I have tried several things, but I can't seem to find a way to
> construct a
> > >> Shell  and giving it a WIN32 window handle as a parent.
> > >>
> > >> Is there a way to do that? or to do something that would do the
> > > equivalent?
> > >>
> > >> Yannick Grosjean
> > >> Solutuons JetSoft
> > >>