windowids.h 3.6 KB

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  1. /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
  2. // Name: windowids.h
  3. // Purpose: topic overview
  4. // Author: wxWidgets team
  5. // Licence: wxWindows licence
  6. /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
  7. /**
  8. @page overview_windowids Window IDs
  9. @tableofcontents
  10. Various controls and other parts of wxWidgets need an ID. Sometimes the ID may
  11. be directly provided by the user or have a predefined value, such as
  12. @c wxID_OPEN. Often, however, the value of the ID is unimportant and is created
  13. automatically by calling wxWindow::NewControlId or by passing @c wxID_ANY as
  14. the ID of an object.
  15. There are two ways to generate an ID. One way is to start at a negative
  16. number, and for each new ID, return the next smallest number. This is fine for
  17. systems that can use the full range of negative numbers for IDs, as this
  18. provides more than enough IDs and it would take a very very long time to run
  19. out and wrap around. However, some systems cannot use the full range of the
  20. ID value. Windows, for example, can only use 16 bit IDs, and only has about
  21. 32000 possible automatic IDs that can be generated by wxWindow::NewControlId.
  22. If the program runs long enough, depending on the program itself, using this
  23. first method would cause the IDs to wrap around into the positive ID range and
  24. cause possible clashes with any directly specified ID values.
  25. The other way is to keep track of the IDs returned by wxWindow::NewControlId
  26. and don't return them again until the ID is completely free and not being used
  27. by any other objects. This will make sure that the ID values do not clash with
  28. one another. This is accomplished by keeping a reference count for each of the
  29. IDs that can possibly be returned by wxWindow::NewControlId. Other IDs are not
  30. reference counted.
  31. @see wxIdManager, wxWindow::NewControlId(), wxWindow::UnreserveControlId()
  32. @section overview_windowids_type Data Types
  33. A wxWindowID is just the integer type for a window ID. It should be used
  34. almost everywhere. To help keep track of the count for the automatically
  35. generated IDs, a new type, wxWindowIDRef exists, that can take the place of
  36. wxWindowID where needed. When an ID is first created, it is marked as reserved.
  37. When assigning it to a wxWindowIDRef, the usage count of the ID is increased,
  38. or set to 1 if it is currently reserved. Assigning the same ID to several
  39. wxWindowIDRefs will keep track of the count. As the wxWindowIDRef gets
  40. destroyed or its value changes, it will decrease the count of the used ID. When
  41. there are no more wxWindowIDRef types with the created ID, the ID is considered
  42. free and can then be used again by wxWindow::NewControlId.
  43. If a created ID is not assigned to a wxWindowIDRef, then it remains reserved
  44. until it is unreserved manually with wxWindow::UnreserveControlId. However, if
  45. it is assigned to a wxWindowIDRef, then it will be unreserved automatically and
  46. will be considered free when the count is 0, and should NOT be manually
  47. unreserved.
  48. wxWindowIDRef can store both automatic IDs from wxWindow::NewControlId and
  49. normal IDs. Reference counting is only done for the automatic IDs. Also,
  50. wxWindowIDRef has conversion operators that allow it to be treated just like a
  51. wxWindowID.
  52. @section overview_windowids_using Using wxWindowIDRef
  53. A wxWindowIDRef should be used in place of a wxWindowID where you want to make
  54. sure the ID is not created again by wxWindow::NewControlId at least until the
  55. wxWindowIDRef is destroyed, usually when the associated object is destroyed.
  56. This is done already for windows, menu items, and tool bar items. It should
  57. only be used in the main thread, as it is not thread safe.
  58. */