ST GET ATTRIBUTES

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4D v16.3

ST GET ATTRIBUTES


ST GET ATTRIBUTES ( {* ;} object ; startSel ; endSel ; attribName ; attribValue {; attribName2 ; attribValue2 ; ... ; attribNameN ; attribValueN} )

Parameter	Type	Description
*	Operator	If specified, object is an object name (string) If omitted, object is a variable or a field
object	Form object	Object name (if * is specified) or Variable or field (if * is omitted)
startSel	Longint	Start of text selection
endSel	Longint	End of text selection
attribName	Longint	Attribute to get
attribValue	Variable	Current value of attribute

Description

The ST GET ATTRIBUTES command is used to recover the current value of a style attribute in a selection of text of the form object(s) designated by object.

If you pass the optional * parameter, this indicates that the object parameter is an object name (string). During execution, if the object has the focus, the command returns information about the object being edited; however, when the object does not have the focus, the command returns information about the data source (field or variable) of the object.
If you omit the * parameter, this indicates that the object parameter is a field or a variable. In this case, you pass a field or variable reference instead of a string and during execution, the command returns information about this field or variable.

The startSel and endSel parameters are used to designate the text selection of the object from which the style attribute is to be read. Pass the position of the first character of the selection in startSel and the position plus one of the last character of the selection in endSel. You can pass 0 in endSel to designate automatically the last character of the text (pass 1 in startSel to designate the first character of the text).
If the values of startSel and endSel are equal or if startSel is greater than endSel (except if endSel value is 0, see above), an error is returned.
The startSel and endSel values do not take any style tags already present in the area into account. They are evaluated on the basis of raw text (text from which style tags have been filtered).

4D provides predefined constants so that you can designate the selection limits automatically in the startSel and endSel parameters. These constants are found in the "Multistyle Text" theme:

Constant	Type	Value	Comment
ST End highlight	Longint	-1001	Designates last character of current text selection in object (*)
ST End text	Longint	0	Designates last character of text contained in object
ST Start highlight	Longint	-1000	Designates first character of current text selection in object (*)
ST Start text	Longint	1	Designates first character of text contained in object

(*) You must pass an object name in object to be able to use this constant. If you pass a reference to a field or variable, the command is applied to all the text of the object.

Pass the name of the attribute to get in the attribName parameter and pass a variable which must recover the current value of the attribute in the attribValue parameter. To specify the attribName parameter, you must use one of the constants of the Multistyle Text Attributes theme.

Constant	Type	Value	Comment
Attribute background color	Longint	8	attribValue=Hexadecimal values or HTML color names (Windows only)
Attribute bold style	Longint	1	attribValue=0: remove bold attribute from selection attribValue=1: apply bold attribute to selection
Attribute font name	Longint	5	attribValue=Font family name (string)
Attribute italic style	Longint	2	attribValue=0: remove italic attribute from selection attribValue=1: apply italic attribute to selection
Attribute strikethrough style	Longint	3	attribValue=0: remove strikethrough attribute from selection attribValue=1: apply strikethrough attribute to selection
Attribute text color	Longint	7	attribValue=Hexadecimal values or HTML color names
Attribute text size	Longint	6	attribValue=Number of points (number)
Attribute underline style	Longint	4	attribValue=0: remove underline attribute from selection attribValue=1: apply underline attribute to selection

You can pass as many attribute/value pairs as you want.

If the value of the attribName attribute is the same for all of the selection, it is returned in attribValue. If this value is different or if object does not contain SPAN tags, the following values are returned:

attribName	attribValue if attribute heterogenous in selection or no SPAN tags
Attribute background color	FFFFFFFF
Attribute bold style	2
Attribute font name	"" (empty string)
Attribute italic style	2
Attribute strikethrough style	2
Attribute text color	FFFFFFFF
Attribute text size	-1
Attribute underline style	2

Example

Given a [Table_1]StyledText field displayed in a form. The object has the Multistyle property and is named "StyledText_t". You want to get the highlighted text as well as the status of the Bold style attribute. You can proceed in two different ways depending on whether you use the object name or the field reference.

Using the object name:

 $text:=ST Get text(*;"StyledText_t";ST Start highlight;ST End highlight)

 ST GET ATTRIBUTES(*;"StyledText_t";ST Start highlight;ST End highlight;Attribute bold style;$bold)

Using the field name:

 GET HIGHLIGHT([Table_1]StyledText;$Begin_l;$End_l)

 $text:=ST Get text([Table_1]StyledText;$Begin_l;$End_l)

 ST GET ATTRIBUTES([Table_1]StyledText;$Begin_l;$End_l;Attribute bold style;$bold)

System variables and sets

After this command is executed, the OK variable is set to 1 if no error occurred; otherwise, it is set to 0. This is the case more particularly when style tags are not evaluated properly (incorrect or missing tags).

In the case of an error, the variable is not changed. When an error occurs on a variable when text is being evaluated, 4D transforms the text into plain text; as a result, the <, > and & characters are converted into HTML entities.