Hi, Shane -

As you know, columns using the DDDW edit style do not behave in the manner you would like.

I've experimented with a proof-of-concept to see if there's a way to emulate the desired behavior. Here is a snapshot of an example where the column uses the DDDW edit style and has both the "Always Show List" and "Always Show Arrow" properties checked:

To accomplish this, I created a small jpg of the drop-down arrow only, placed a picture object in the DataWindow and increased the Width of Dropdown(%) above 100 until it looked right.

Be aware that in order to create the jpg of the arrow, I had to snapshot the running app since the arrow renders differently in the DW Painter. If all of your column object where you would use this are of the same height, then you'd only need a single jpg, but different column heights necessitate different images be used.

To get the list to appear when clicking on the "drop-down arrow" (picture), I put the code below in the LButtonDown event of the DW control:

Integer li_pos
Long    ll_row
String  ls_obj, ls_objname, ls_col

// The column object's name is: numbervalue
// The picture object's name is: p_numbervalue_dda (dda->DropDownArrow)
ls_obj = This.GetObjectAtPointer()
li_pos = Pos(ls_obj,"~t")
ll_row = Long(Mid(ls_obj,li_pos + 1))
ls_objname = Left(ls_obj,li_pos - 1)
If Left(ls_objname,2) = "p_" And Right(ls_objname,4) = "_dda" Then
   ls_col = Mid(Left(ls_objname,Len(ls_objname) - 4),3)
   This.Post SetRow(ll_row)
   This.Post SetColumn(ls_col)
End If

By using a naming scheme for the picture object(s), this short event script should work for any number of similar pairs of column/picture objects.

Granted, it's nowhere near as easy as having the DataWindow Engine do the work, but since it currently cannot do what you want or need, this might be an option to consider. Keep in mind there's no guarantee an enhancement request will be implemented, and even if it is, the probability is that it won't happen for some time.

Best regards, John