positioning probe windows

[Rick Riolo]

I tried the suggestion of Ken Cline in a recent message
to swarm-support, and I don't get it to work.

For example, if I try (in ObserverSwarm-buildObjects, but I don't think
that is important):
  id aProbeDisplay = NULL;
  ...
  aProbeDisplay = [probeDisplayManager createProbeDisplayFor: parameters];
  [aProbeDisplay->topLevel setPositionX: 0 Y: 0];
  ...
then I get these compiler messages:
    ObserverSwarm.m:69: warning: static access to object of type `id'
    ObserverSwarm.m:69: structure has no member named `topLevel'
    make: *** [ObserverSwarm.o] Error 1
which is not surprising, I think, since the compiler doesn't know
what object (structure) aProbeDisplay is for.
And as Ken points out, if you try to do
   SimpleProbeDisplay *aProbeDisplay;
then we get a complaint that topLevel is protected.
So I must be missing something about how Ken did it....Ken?

Anyway....
The basic issue is how to get the (proper) widget for a probe,
so it can be sent messages like the setPositionX:Y: .
A long time ago sven asked/commented as follows
  (from  
http://www.santafe.edu/projects/swarm/archive/list-archive.9612/0102.html)
-----
Now, the last kind of window is the probe display, which is (ahem) kind of
complex. My question is: for purposes of changing the size and/or position
of the probe display, is the Frame element named 'topLevel' the relevant
widget to be manipulated?

If so, the classes CompleteProbeDisplay and SimpleProbeDisplay both need a
method like -(id) getTopLevelFrame which returns a pointer to the 'topLevel'
data item. Then we can do
[[probeDisplay getTopLevelFrame] setWindowGeometry: str];
-------
As I looked at this stuff it seemed to me that what is needed
is a -(id) getTopLevelFrame method in those *ProbeDisplay objects.

I couldn't find an answer to sven's question/comment.
Is there some other way to do this positioning of probes?
If not, could this method be added?

thanks!
 - r

Rick Riolo                           address@hidden
Program for Study of Complex Systems (PSCS)
4068 Randall Lab                
University of Michigan         Ann Arbor MI 48109-1120
Phone: 313 763 3323                  Fax: 313 763 9267
http://pscs.physics.lsa.umich.edu/PEOPLE/rlr-home.html
http://pscs.physics.lsa.umich.edu//pscs.html



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