Tech Articles


Resizing a Response Window or User Object


Here is a technique you can use to resize a response window or userobject as needed. It makes use of the GetWindowLong and SetWindowLong Windows API methods. The oldest reference I found to this is from Eric Aling back in 2000.

In a nutshell, you are changing the border around the object to one which Windows allows to be resized. What's even nicer about this is the standard resize events are triggered so you can reposition/change objects within the window as well (PFC resize service for example). From Eric's original post:

"The Get function retrieves the complete definition of the window in 
a big long variable. All the bits in this long value describe the window. 
So there are bits for the type of border (which indicates if a window is 
resizable), menu, colors etc.etc. We can modify this long value, altering 
the design of the window. Using the SetWindowLong() we update the window with 
our specific modifications."

I used this in ancestor code of a userobject I use to create visible panels within the main window.

// Unicode declarations, used 'A' for ANSI
function long GetWindowLongW (long hWindow, integer nIndex) Library "user32.dll"
function long SetWindowLongW (long hWindow, integer nIndex, long dwNewLong) library "user32.dll"

// code in my post constructor event
n_cst_numerical lnv_num // PFC numeric service
long        ll_Styles
boolean        lb_Control

constant long    WS_THICKFRAME = 262144
constant long    WS_SYSMENU = 524288

ll_styles = GetWindowLongw(handle(THIS), -16)
if ll_styles <> 0 then

    ll_styles = lnv_num.of_BitWiseOr(ll_styles, WS_THICKFRAME)
// don't need control menu but leave this for reference 
//    if ab_Control then 
//        ll_styles = lnv_num.of_BitWiseOr(ll_styles, WS_SYSMENU)
//    end if

    SetWindowLongW(handle(THIS), -16, ll_styles)
end if
At first my UO cannot be resized.

Non resizable window

 

 

 

Now it can!

Resizable window

 

 

 

I've seen other references to these API calls for manipulating windows for other things but I have not investigated further.

Comments (0)
There are no comments posted here yet

Find Articles by Tag

Performance CI/CD SqlExecutor PowerBuilder Compiler Excel COM PBDOM Authorization Text Script RESTClient Open Source Syntax iOS .NET Std Framework Import Installation PBVM SnapObjects Stored Procedure Database Table Data Variable Mobile Database Import JSON Export Visual Studio SQL Server Elevate Conference Jenkins Database Table Schema WinAPI Database Painter Branch & Merge Database Object Deployment Windows OS Migration Messagging OLE RibbonBar Builder Class CoderObject OAuth 2.0 CrypterObject UI SQL OAuth Error SnapDevelop Model Sort UI Themes Bug Database Table Event Handler JSON PDF SDK Graph TFS IDE Azure ActiveX Data DLL Window Debugging DataWindow Filter Web Service Proxy Platform RibbonBar ODBC Event Handling Encryption Configuration PDFlib PBNI Authentication TreeView Service NativePDF License Source Code 32-bit PowerBuilder TLS/SSL .NET DataStore 64-bit DataWindow JSON Export JSON Repository Expression Android PowerBuilder (Appeon) XML Linux OS JSONGenerator PostgreSQL ODBC driver Menu Testing Icon UI Modernization Oracle Debug Application Automated Testing BLOB Windows 10 Icons SVN Resize Validation DragDrop API REST .NET Assembly GhostScript Event WebBrowser RichTextEdit Control OrcaScript SOAP Database Connection DevOps PFC PostgreSQL Git SqlModelMapper PowerServer Web PowerServer Mobile Transaction External Functions Web API MessageBox Source Control Design Interface Array TortoiseGit C# File HTTPClient Database Profile PowerScript (PS) Trial Debugger InfoMaker Outlook Encoding Charts DataType JSONParser