Viewer tab

Use the Viewer tab of the project settings to configure the project viewer and change certain runtime behaviors.

Titlebar

Select this option and type a new name into the field provided to specify or change the default titlebar text for the Viewer window.

Minimize Box, Maximize Box, Close Box

Select or clear these options to show (enable) or hide (disable) these buttons on the Viewer window.

Start Maximized

Select this option to maximize the Viewer window automatically when you run your project.

Menu

Select this option and then click Options to specify which menu options are available at run time. When the Runtime menu options dialog displays (as follows), click the checkboxes to show (enable) or hide (disable) these menu options.

Resize Border

Select this option to allow the user to resize the Viewer window during run time.

Status Line

Select this option to display the Status Line in the runtime project.

Startup screen

Click the combo box and select the screen (.scc or .scr file) or screen group (.sg file) that you want to display automatically when a thin client accesses your project.

Note: Another way to specify a screen or screen group as the startup screen is to right-click on it in the Project Explorer and then choose Set as startup from the shortcut menu.

Note: When the first native screen is saved in a project, that screen will be set as the default startup screen.

Show ???? when quality is not GOOD

Some screen objects (for example, Text Box) can be configured to directly display tag values. Select this option to have an object display question marks (????) instead of the tag value when its quality is not GOOD (that is, BAD).

Hide Taskbar

Select this option to hide the Windows taskbar by default.

Disable Palm Rejection

Select this option to disable Palm Rejection during project run time. Palm Rejection is a feature on Windows touchscreen devices that detects and rejects accidental touches from the operator's palm. However, it can somewhat slow the touchscreen's responsiveness, so disabling it can improve the performance of the project runtime.

Palm Rejection is not available on anything other than Windows touchscreen devices, so selecting this option will have no effect in projects running on other target platforms.

Enable ToolTips

Select this option to see Windows ToolTips when running your project. You can configure tooltips in the Hint field of the Object Properties dialog of each object.

Save pictures in separate files

When this option is selected, images that you paste into a screen are automatically converted to Linked Picture objects and then saved as separate bitmap (.bmp) image files in your project folder at <project name>\Web\Resources. You can then reuse the images without increasing the size of your project, because every instance of the image will link to the same file. That should improve runtime performance.

When this option is cleared, images that you paste into a screen are kept as Bitmap objects and embedded in the screen file. Each instance of an image will be embedded, so if you use the same image more than once, it may greatly increase the size of the screen file.

Note: The effect of this option is permanent: once a pasted image is converted to a Linked Picture object, clearing the option will not convert the image back to a Bitmap object.

The Resources sub-folder is automatically maintained by the development application, and it is used only for the bitmap images that are pasted and converted. You should not put other image files in it, because they may be moved or deleted. Instead, put other images that you want to link to in the Web sub-folder.

Auto Screen Scaling

Select this option to automatically scale project screens to fit the displays on client stations, even dynamically when a user resizes the viewer window. This is done by calculating the ratio between the project's full display resolution and the client station's actual display size and then multiplying both the screen size and the screen position by that ratio. Screens are only downscaled to fit smaller displays; they are not upscaled to fit larger displays.

This option applies only to the local Viewer module and the remote Secure Viewer. It does not apply to the other types of project clients, which have their own Auto Screen Scaling options in their respective settings.

This option is cleared by default because downscaling screens can sometimes make them unusable (for example, buttons too small to be pressed, gauges too small to be read). If the screens are kept at full scale, a user can at least scroll and pan to see an entire screen.

Note: This feature is not supported in projects configured to run on the Embedded target platform.

Active area indication

Click (enable) the Show Object Edge and Change Mouse Cursor checkboxes in this area to modify the object edge and the mouse cursor when moving the cursor over any object where the Command animation has been applied.

Virtual Keyboard

When this option is selected, the Virtual Keyboard (VK) is enabled for your project. The Virtual Keyboard allows the user to enter data (text or numeric values) during run time using the client station's touchscreen instead of a physical keyboard or keypad. For example, a Text object with the Text Data Link animation applied and the Input Enabled option selected.

Note: This option does not apply when your project is viewed in Web Thin Clients, which have their own Virtual Keyboard settings. For more information, see Configure project settings for Web Thin Client.

You can establish a default configuration for the Virtual Keyboard:

Default

Select the default keyboard type to be used in your project, when no keyboard type is specified by the calling object or function.

Show Hint

When this option is selected, a hint is displayed in the title bar of the Virtual Keyboard window. For a specific object, you can configure the hint in the object properties. Otherwise, type a string value in the Show Hint box to serve as a default hint for all keyboards in your project.

Enable Min/Max Fields

When this option is selected and the Keypad type of keyboard is used, the minimum and maximum values allowed for the associated project tag will be displayed at the bottom of the keyboard. For some screen objects, you can configure those values in the object properties. Otherwise, the Min and Max properties of the associated project tag are used by default.

Note: The Min and Max fields are displayed only on the Keypad type of keyboard, and only when the associated project tag is of Integer or Real type. If Min is greater than Max, user input will be disabled. If Min/Max configured on the object properties differs from Min/Max configured in the tag properties, the project runtime will attempt to scale the user input accordingly.

Enable multi-line text input

When this option is selected, the AlphaNumeric type of keyboard can be used to enter multi-line text, with "new line" control characters (that is, CR+LF) between lines, in screen objects that accept multi-line text input.

Built-in Dialogs

Select or type the scale at which the built-in dialogs (that is, Logon, E-Sign, and Virtual Keyboard) should be displayed during run time. This will make it easier to see and use the dialogs on project runtime clients with small, high-resolution displays. You can specify a scale between 100% (native resolution) and 400%, or you can select Auto which means the client will automatically select the best scale for the display.

Mouse Cursor

Select this option to show the mouse cursor in the runtime project.

Execute only topmost object commands

This option controls how your project behaves when the user clicks in an area where two or more screen objects overlap. If this option is checked, only the commands on the topmost object will be executed. If this option is not checked, the commands on all of the overlapping objects will be executed.

Note: The topmost object is the one with the highest ID number. (The ID number of an object is displayed in the status bar at the bottom of the development environment.) You can use the Move to Back / Move to Front and Move Backward / Move Forward tools to change the order in which objects are stacked.

Enable focus on buttons, commands and text objects

This option is selected by default. When it is selected, clicking on on a command button or text input during run time will put focus on that object, as shown in the illustration below. When the focus is on text input, a box is shown around the text. When the focus is not on the text, there is no box.

After that, the end-user can press Tab to tab through all such objects in the screen or they can press Enter to activate the currently focused object (that is, click on a command button, enter text in a text input), similar to a normal Windows application. This is useful if the client station has a physical keyboard and the end-user needs to quickly work through many such objects, because it saves time that would otherwise be spent repeatedly switching between the keyboard and the mouse or touchscreen.

To force the end-user to always use the mouse or touchscreen to activate screen objects, clear this option.

Use popup input for text objects

Select this option to display a small popup for text inputs, as shown in the illustration below:

This is an alternative to typing directly into the text object (which can seem like editing the screen itself and therefore be confusing to some end-users) and to displaying a Virtual Keyboard for input (which requires using the mouse or touchscreen).

Note:

If the Virtual Keyboard option (above) is selected, it will override this option.

Also, if the Enable focus on buttons, commands and text objects option (above) is cleared, this option is automatically selected. This is to ensure there is some on-screen indication of which text input is currently active.

Use .scr extension for screen files

When this option is selected, screen files are saved with the .scr extension in your project folder. When this option is cleared, screen files are saved with the .scc extension.

The .scr extension has been deprecated because some anti-virus programs block it, and that can cause problems during project run time. The .scc extension supersedes the .scr extension, and it should be allowed by most if not all anti-virus programs.

This option was implemented in order to maintain backward compatibility with existing projects. In projects that are created with the latest version of this software, this option is cleared by default. In projects that were created with earlier versions of this software and then upgraded to the latest version, this option might be selected by default.

If you do not have issues during project run time, you do not need to do anything. If you do have issues, however, you can try selecting or clearing this option, as needed. When you do, all of the existing screen files in your project folder will be saved again with the preferred extension. Also, if you manually add a screen file to your project folder — for example, by copying it from another project folder — that file will be saved with the preferred extension the next time you either verify your project or open the screen for editing.

Multi-Touch Settings

Configure the default Multi-Touch settings for all screens in your project. For more information, see About the Multi-Touch settings for project screens.

Enhanced graphics (including anti-aliasing and opacity) is enabled by default. To turn it off for a project, open the project file (<project name>.APP) in a text editor and add:

[Desktop]

EnableEnhancedGraphics=0