Masters

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November 23, 2014 Common Tasks No Comments

Masters are like Templates *

When you need to create many similar screens, you can create a Master screen and derive other screens from it:

  • All derived screens will display widgets from a master.
  • Any changes made to a master screen will also be automatically applied to all derived screens.
  • Some attributes of master’s widgets (like captions and such) can be altered on derived screens. What can’t be altered are the position and size of the widgets derived from a master.

Example:

  • A web heading is usually the same on many screens in a web application; thus it is a good tactics to place heading widgets on a master (as opposed to making separate copies for each screen).

You can manage the masters in Masters panel, below the Screen Tree:

Masters are managed on panel below the screen tree

 

Changes are Automatically Applied to All Child Screens *

Any changes made on a master will be applied to all derived (child) screens:

  • Adding a widget will display that widget on all derived screens.
  • Changing a caption on a widget will change it on all derived screens

When changes will not be propagated:

  • Change won’t be propagated to any widgets that has been altered; they will retain their own values instead.

Creating and Applying a Master *

Create a new master in one of two ways:

  • Copy an existing screen and paste it into Masters panel.
  • Create a blank master by “New Master” command above the Masters panel:

Creating a new master

 

Apply a master to a screen:

  • Right-click on a screen and choose “Apply Master to Screen” option, then choose one of the existing masters to apply.

Apply master to a screen

 

To unlink a screen from a master:

1. Right-click on a derived screen and choose “Unlink Screen from Master”.

2. Choose whether to delete derived widgets or to leave them as copies:

Unlink a screen from a master

 

Identifying Screens Derived from Masters *

When a screen is derived from a master, you can recognize it by a master indicator icon on a Screen Tree:

Indicator that a screen is derived from a master