Send_Message optimisation

As you'll doubtless know there are several core routines used in Basic+ to interact with OI forms, probably the three most important being:

• Get_Property()
• Set_Property()
• Send_Message()

To maximize performance when dealing with properties it is common practice to pass @rm-delimited arrays to Get_Property and Set_Property like so:

0001  /*  0002     Example to illustrate accessing properties via @rm-delimited arrays. 0003       0004     i.e to replace code like this: 0005      0006        call set_Property( @window, "TEXT", "Customers" ) 0007        call set_Property( @window, "TRACKINGSIZE", trkSize ) 0008        call set_property( @window, "VISIBLE", TRUE$ )  0009         0010     … and so on… 0011  */ 0012   0013     objxArray =        @window 0014     propArray =        "TEXT" 0015     dataArray =        "CUSTOMERS" 0016    0017     objxArray := @rm : @window 0018     proparray := @rm : "TRACKINGSIZE" 0019     dataArray := @rm : trkSize 0020   0021     objxArray := @rm : @window 0022     propArray := @rm : "VISIBLE" 0023     dataArray := @rm : TRUE$ 0024   0025     call set_Property( objxArray, propArray, dataArray ) 0026     

A recent support query from one of our clients was to enquire if the Send_Message() function also supported a similar interface, and unfortunately the answer is no - it does not accept @rm-delimited arguments when invoked.

However the question did trigger a distant memory that led me to dig up a very old email thread from many years ago between ourselves and developers at Revelation, during which a similar capability was discussed and implemented, but alas, it appears, never documented.

Whilst Send_Message() itself doesn't support @rm-delimited arrays of message data, the Set_Property() function does support a "SEND_MESSAGE" property which can be used in a similar manner - you simply wrap the message name and arguments into an @fm-delimited array and use this as the new property value to set.

e.g.

0001  /*  0002     Example to illustrate calling messages via @rm-delimited  0003     arrays.  0004       0005     i.e to replace code like this:  0006        0007       call send_Message( @window, "COLOR_BY_POS", colPos, rowPos, cellColor )  0008       call send_Message( @window, "COLSTYLE", colPos, colStyle )  0009         0010    … and so on…  0011  */ 0012   0013     colPos    = 3 0014     rowPos    = 0 0015     cellColor = RED$ : @fm : WHITE$ : @fm : GREEN$ : @fm : YELLOW$ 0016   0017     convert @fm to @vm in cellColor 0018   0019     objxArray =        @window : ".TABLE_1" 0020     propArray =        "SEND_MESSAGE" 0021     dataArray =        "COLOR_BY_POS" : @fm : colPos : @fm : rowPos : | 0022                        @fm : cellColor 0023   0024     objxArray := @rm : @window : ".TABLE_1" 0025     proparray := @rm : "SEND_MESSAGE" 0026     dataArray := @rm : "COLSTYLE" : @fm : colPos : @fm : colStyle 0027   0028     call set_Property( objxArray, propArray, dataArray ) 0029     

Notice the convert statement in the code above - if you use any system delimiters in your message arguments (@fm,@vm,@svm,@tm) then you must convert them down a level, because the SEND_MESSAGE property will convert them up a level before executing the message internally.

In this way we can duplicate the stacking behaviour of Get and Set_Property for Send_Message.