Field visibleBinding* for non-empty text?

I'm trying to build a chain of fields that appear as previous ones are filled in:

Code: Select all

     Host: [host device menu]
     Device Address: [device id on host menu]


Host is a menu of host devices already configured, and starts out with "- no selection -". I want the Device Address field to appear once Host is chosen. But the visibleBindingId/visibleBindingValue feature only seems to work for equality, not inequality - I want to say, "Make this field appear if the "host" field is not empty."

While we're at it, how about just adding a visibleBindingOperation so you can have equal, not-equal, empty, not empty, set, unset, etc.? You'll get out of the "was visibleBindingValue a false or a zero?" business, and visibleBindingValue only needs to be set for text comparisons.

Oh, and why is visibleBinding and enabledBinding not working the same? (Why is there a visibleBindingValue but no enabledBindingValue?) Shouldn't they be using exactly the same mechanism?

Cheers
-- perry

[jay (support)]

But the visibleBindingId/visibleBindingValue feature only seems to work for equality, not inequality - I want to say, "Make this field appear if the "host" field is not empty."

Yep, I ran across that myself. Maybe in the next version of the API.

While we're at it, how about just adding a visibleBindingOperation so you can have equal, not-equal, empty, not empty, set, unset, etc.? You'll get out of the "was visibleBindingValue a false or a zero?" business, and visibleBindingValue only needs to be set for text comparisons.

That's adding a bunch of sophistication in the binding process that we don't get for free using Cocoa Bindings - perhaps in the future.

Oh, and why is visibleBinding and enabledBinding not working the same? (Why is there a visibleBindingValue but no enabledBindingValue?) Shouldn't they be using exactly the same mechanism?

To annoy you...

Seriously, because the way it works now is based (somewhat) on how Cocoa Bindings work (and we rely on them for the implementation) and somewhat in an organically grown way - Enabling came first so it's not quite as full-featured as visibility. Future releases will flesh out the UI XML more based on developer feedback and our own experiences.

But the visibleBindingId/visibleBindingValue feature only seems to work for equality, not inequality - I want to say, "Make this field appear if the "host" field is not empty."

Yep, I ran across that myself. Maybe in the next version of the API...

Did this ever happen? (If it did, I couldn't find any documentation).

[jay (support)]

Nope. It's on the request list but not very high priority.