Cleaning up the background for a window

[Wayne C.]

Is it possible to clean up the background when a window is displayed?

In the early days of our use of Genie, I moved everything on every screen to the right since Genie seemed to use a left margin that caused some problems. In any event, every label and data field has been moved. The problem is that when a window is displayed, the background (the previous screen) appears scrambled. It looks pretty sloppy. Is there any way to remedy this? I tried using the combination of the "saveScreenImage" and "showAsWindow" API. This didn't work. I think the window displayed twice and the background screen seemed to disappear. I think I spoke to somebody from Profound about this and I vaguely remember the explanation was that the original DDS specs (not the Genie mods) of the previous screen are sent to the browser in this situation.

Is there anything I can do to fix this?

Thanx,
Wayne C.

[Scott Klement]

I can understand why your background might not be shifted to the right, but... I don't understand why it's "scrambled"?

[Wayne C.]

Hi Scott,
I'll send a log file so that you can see what I mean. On the screen/log file that I'm sending, the labels seem to be anchored, but the corresponding data fields have shifted position and the data's appearance may have changed (font and/or font size) or the data may be overlap its corresponding label. "Scrambled" may have been the wrong word but in any event, it looks messy. I'll send the log file to supportand you can take a look at it.

Thanks a lot

[Scott Wagers]

Wayne,

After looking at the log file you sent along with your Genie skin I can see the issues you were referencing. The reason behind this is due to the way Genie handles displaying the existing screen when the window is brought up. On a green screen when there is a window over a screen the original input fields are all converted to an output field and the information existing is displayed in these output fields. Genie does the same thing by converting the input fields on the existing screen to output fields, this is the cause of the shifting you're seeing. The difference is this isn't as noticeable when it's done on a green screen as opposed to in the browser with Genie.

Basically what is happening is the customizations you made to the screen with input fields is not the same screen that is displaying when the window is in view.

There are a couple of ways to correct this:
1) You could customize each of the output fields on the screen with the window overlay. You would do this by opening the designer mode and selecting the A%CCD107B2 screen and making your adjustments and saving the screen. (This is the more complicated method)

2) You could add an additional identifier to the screen before the window is overlayed which would cause Genie's screen identification to fail. In this case on the A%CCD107B2 screen we added an identifier to the 'AsWt:' output. This output disappears when the window is overlayed and Genie does not detect it causing the following result. (See Screenshots)

[Wayne C.]

Scott, thanks for the 2 options to fix this. I'm trying method 1 at this time and it works well enough. I don't really understand method 2. Are you saying that when all is said and done, the window would appear over the customized
A%CCD107B2 screen? I don't understand what you meant by "You could add an additional identifier to the screen before the window is overlayed..." . Are you saying that you add this second identifier on the fly somehow (by adding code to the onpageload or onload events?) or do you actually open the Designer and actually select a second identifier?

The first method is working for me because I have the time to go field by field to make the screen appearance more presentable. I think the second option seems better although I don't understand how to pull it off and the 2 identifiers is confusing to me.

If you have the time, could you clarify option 2?

[Scott Wagers]

Sure thing Wayne, by adding another identifier to the A%CCD107B2 screen and setting the second identifier as a label that is not present when the window is on the screen causes Genie to customize the screen automatically by default. (See the A%CCD107B2 result.png screenshot) This means all of the shifted fields are left in place and appear with some different formatting as opposed to being shifted all over the screen because the customizations are different.

All I did in the example was find the 'AsWt:' output. (I knew this output label was not displayed when the window is up) Right-click the label and select 'Mark As Identifier'. Once the field is marked as an identifier the surrounding outline should turn red. Any fields marked as identifiers need to be present for Genie to properly detect them. So when the window is not up both fields will be detected and Genie will properly display your customizations. Once the window is up and the 'AsWt:' field is no longer detected, Genie will resort to customizing the screen based on what there. Which results in what you see in the screenshot.

This method is more of a quick easy fix, as opposed to manually adjusting all of the shifted fields like the 1st suggestion.

I hope this explains the second option a little more, if not please let me know.

[Wayne C.]

Thanks Scott. I get it now. I think I was more confused with what the final output would look like... hoping it would look like my final customization rather than the default version. In any event, I'm using option 1 because I can keep my customized function keys and the layout is a little closer to the final customization. Anyways, I learned something. I didn't realize you could customize the screen after the window was displayed. That is coming in handy.

Thanks again for your help.