If you have an USB device with HID protocol, you can easily use it from your Xojo application. Please check out the HIDAPIDeviceMBS class for macOS, Windows and Linux. With the recent 24.1 plugins, we upgraded the classes to work even better.
You may start with enumerating of available devices. This should find all the HID devices connected to your computer like various keyboards, mice, joysticks or whatever you connect. For Linux, you may need to use chmod with sudo to grant permissions to all applications to connect to the devices. On macOS and Windows, you may just freely connect to your device as long as no standard driver grabbed it.
Let's enumerate the devices and look for ours:
Dim DevicePath As String
// find our device
Const VendorID = 1234
Const ProductID = 2345
Dim d As HIDAPIDeviceInfoMBS = HIDAPIDeviceMBS.Enumerate
While d <> Nil // go thru all enumerated devices
System.DebugLog d.Path+", "+d.ManufacturerString+", "+d.ProductString+", "+d.InterfaceNumber.ToString
If d.VendorID = VendorID and d.ProductID = ProductID Then
// found it
DevicePath = d.Path
Exit
End If
d = d.NextDevice
Wend
(more)
Nickenich, Germany - (March 12th, 2024) -- Monkeybread Software today is pleased to announce MBS Xojo Plugins 24.1 for macOS, Linux and Windows, the latest update to their product that is easily the most powerful plugin collection currently available for Xojo. MBS Xojo Plugins have been updated and now includes over 3000 classes and 81,000 documented features, and the versatile plugins have gained more new functions:
In our SQL Plugin we have the SQLiteFunctionMBS class to define custom functions for use in SQLite with our plugin. Since we added a path property to InternalSQLiteLibraryMBS module, we can even load our plugin as extension for using custom functions in SQLiteDatabase class, too. Our unicode extension for SQLite got updated for Xojo 2022r4.
Beside our NSSpeechSynthesizer class for speech synthesization we added lower level AVSpeechSynthesizerMBS and related classes for macOS and iOS. If you like to check network availability on macOS and iOS, please check the new NWPathMonitorMBS class.
Our OverlayMBS class allows you to show custom windows and define the content with a picture including transparency and without the usual OS widgets. We rewrote the mouse handling to allow you to move them by background. You can decide to implement mouse events or have the control ignore mouse events altogether.
We rewrote our HIDAPI classes and added a new BusType property to the HIDAPIDeviceInfoMBS class. We added DeviceInfo and GetReportDescriptor functions to HIDAPIDeviceMBS class. We enabled logging for LibUSB on Linux to help finding issues.
To support touch events better on macOS, we upgraded our NSTouchMBS class with new properties. The CanvasGesturesMBS class got events to report touch events and NSEventMBS class can report the touches.
The parser in DynaPDF got upgraded to report current selection text and report all 4 coordinates for the text, useful for rotated text.
The linux libraries in our plugins are optimized for size and lost over 33 MB in total.
Our CURLEmailMBS class can send attachment only emails without text and we added methods in EKEventStoreMBS class to better ask for permissions for events. We added character count and string value to NSCharacterSetMBS class for debugging, the MidiThruConnectionMBS class got a find() function, the SCNViewMBS class can request a preferred rendering API or a low power device, the NSProcessInfoPowerStateDidChangeNotification can report a power state change in NSProcessInfoMBS class and we added willShowContextualMenu and didCloseContextualMenu events to 34 controls.
Finally we updated DynaPDF to version 4.0.84.246, HIDAPI to 0.14 and SQLite to version 3.45.1.
See release notes for a complete list of changes.
New in this prerelease of the 24.1 plugins:
- Reduced size of Win plugin a little bit by optimizing stub code for macOS/Linux.
- Improved linking of linux libraries to do more stripping of unused code to save 33 MB in total.
- Removed UniMotionMBS module.
Download:
monkeybreadsoftware.de/xojo/download/plugin/Prerelease/ or
from DropBox.
Or ask us to be added to our shared DropBox folder.
You can subscribe to our Xojo mailing list to get notified for new pre-release and release versions.
If you plan to do ZUGFeRD or Fracture-X invoices in FileMaker or Xojo, you may sooner or later see our DynaPDF offering. Our MBS FileMaker Plugin and the MBS Xojo DynaPDF Plugin help reading and writing the XML data in the PDF document. We also have XML functions to help building or parsing the XML document. And DynaPDF can help to make a correct PDF/A document for the output and optionally sign it digitally with a certificate.
Read embedded XML
To read a PDF, you need DynaPDF Lite or higher. Once you opened a PDF document for import, you can check access embedded files.
With the Lite version you can import from multipel documents to merge them together. Or extract images or text from the document to analyze them.
(more)
In Xojo you have two ways to compare objects. You can use equals operators or the is operator.
Let us show you when to use "is" instead of equals "=".
The "is" keyword will compare the internal reference value, the pointer to the memory used for the object. This avoids calling any compare operator and is usually faster. If there is no compare operator, the same compare code as for = runs.
If you use the equals sign (or <, <=, >, >= or <>), Xojo will decide whether to call the operator_compare method on the class, if it offers one. But even if the class has such an operator, a compare to a hard coded nil will just do the pointer comparison. Be aware that Xojo looks on the type of variable you use. If you use object for a variable type, the operator isn't called.
When the second object to compare is a variable (or property or function result), the code is different. It first compares whether the first object is nil. If it is not nil, you get a call of the Operator_Compare method if it exists. If it is nil, the second object is. If you ever write an Operator_Compare yourself, please be aware that the other object may be nil.
(more)
The March/April (22.2) issue of
xDev Magazine is now available. Here's a quick preview of what's inside:
Vision of the Future? by Marc Zeedar
Apple's Vision Pro is finally here and Marc has thoughts. Lots and lots of thoughts!
Design Patterns Part 3 by Marc Zeedar
Our design pattern series continues with the Factory pattern, which helps you produce new objects.
Rasp Pi Electronic Fun Part 6 by Eugene Dakin
Eugene shows how to use your Raspberry Pi to control a motor.
Hybrid Android Apps by Tim Dietrich
Tim explores the line between fully-native apps and Web apps by introducing a hybrid model that uses Web technologies to make the app more cross-platform.
Opinion: DMA and Apple by Marc Zeedar
The European Union's new law to control big tech is going into effect this month and Apple's "compliance" is controversial.
Plus: Topics such as how to use the Static keyword in Xojo, finding the location of your device, AI, procrastination, and more!
New in this prerelease of the 24.1 plugins:
- Fixed an edge case with Replace in JSONMBS where it didn't catch all spots.
- Fixed problem with Substitute with too small output buffer.
- Improved CURLEmailMBS class to allow the creation of attachment only emails.
- Enabled logging for LibUSB on Linux.
- Updated DynaPDF to version 4.0.84.246.
- Added SelText property for DynaPDFParserMBS class to query found text.
- Added SelBBox2 method for DynaPDFParserMBS class to query all 4 points of current text box.
- Changed StringValue in NSCharacterSetMBS class to property, so we see it in the debugger.
- Added CharacterCount property for NSCharacterSetMBS class for debugging.
- Improved NSTokenFieldControlMBS by to work better with our custom cell class.
- Added SetPrintBacktraceAndAbortHandler method to SignalHandlerMBS class.
Download:
monkeybreadsoftware.de/xojo/download/plugin/Prerelease/ or
from DropBox.
Or ask us to be added to our shared DropBox folder.
You can subscribe to our Xojo mailing list to get notified for new pre-release and release versions.
About two months left until we start our MBS Xojo Developer Conference in Andernach, Germany.
With a recent registration from Belgium, we got over 40 people from 13 countries:
🇩🇪, 🇳🇱, 🇬🇧, 🇺🇸, 🇫🇷, 🇨🇭, 🇪🇸, 🇨🇦, 🇵🇱, 🇦🇹, 🇩🇰, 🇸🇪 & 🇧🇪
Friday dinner
For the friday dinner, we will go to the Taverne Olympus, a greek restaurant in Andernach. Family Thomopoulos runs this place successfully since 1981 and looks forward to serve us greek specialties.
We meet 17:40 o'clock outside the hotel and walk over to the restaurant. We may need 15 minutes for about 950m. Basically to the Rhein gate, op the alley and then left the Hochstraße and then walk through the Koblenz gate and follow the Koblenz street to the restaurant on the left side.
If you can't join us for the restaurant, please let us know, so we don't waste a spot. From the restaurant, you can leave at any time to get your train. The station is 1.1km away through Am Stadtgraben and Bahnhof street.
We may be limited to 40 people there. But we assume a few of you leave friday after the last session.
(more)
New in this prerelease of the 24.1 plugins:
Download:
monkeybreadsoftware.de/xojo/download/plugin/Prerelease/ or
from DropBox.
Or ask us to be added to our shared DropBox folder.
You can subscribe to our Xojo mailing list to get notified for new pre-release and release versions.
Let's say you make a library, a plugin or just your own set of classes. You use them in various applications, so you add them to your projects. But you don't use all parts always. If you can segment them and maybe help the Xojo compiler, it can strip out unused project items and produce smaller applications.
Use cases may be one project, which can be compiled to both the full version and a demo version. Or a Pro and a Lite version. Or a viewer vs. editor version of the application. Or simply you have a ton of utility classes, but don't need them for the current app. Then you would like to not include all the parts.
We use various of this techniques with MBS Plugin to reduce the size of your built applications. We actively avoid dependencies between plugins as much as possible.
Project Items
The Xojo compiler can strip out whole items in the project. A window that is never referenced in the current version, will be stripped. You can wrap the only reference for one part in a #if section and avoid referencing it in the smaller app version:
#if ProVersion
Dim e as new EditorWindow
e.show
#else
MessageBox "Please buy Pro version."
#endif
You may define boolean constants in a module to do this. Toggle them either manually, via IDE scripting or build steps with scripts. This also helps with target constants to only include some items that are only for one platform:
#if targetWindows then
WindowsModule.DoSomething
#elseif targetMacOS
MacModule.DoSomething
#endif
The other module can be stripped. Same for images, classes, controls, windows and other project items.
(more)
About two months left until we start our MBS Xojo Developer Conference in Andernach, Germany.
More attendees
We got a few more registrations so we can add Denmark, Sweden and Austria to the country list:
🇩🇪, 🇳🇱, 🇬🇧, 🇺🇸, 🇫🇷, 🇨🇭, 🇪🇸, 🇨🇦, 🇵🇱, 🇦🇹, 🇩🇰 & 🇸🇪
New Session
Jeremy will come and talk about handling exceptions. Of course you can ask him questions about mobile development as he has a very successful iOS app business using Xojo.
Managing exceptions like a pro
Detecting bugs and fixing them is very important as a developer.
Managing exceptions can take a lot of time to implement. This session will present Sentry.io using an open-source set of classes written in Xojo.
by Jérémie Leroy
(more)
Recently a few clients run into a problem with using ODBC databases:
IM004 [iODBC][Driver Manager]Driver's SQLAllocEnv() failed
The ODBC manager (called iODBC) can't load the ODBC driver for the database you like to connect to. By default on macOS we load "/usr/lib/libiodbc.2.dylib" as the ODBC manager, but this library seems to be outdated.
(more)
New in this prerelease of the 24.1 plugins:
- Updated DynaPDF to version 4.0.83.243.
- Implemented better MovableByWindowBackground for OverlayMBS class on Windows to work with mouse events.
- Fixed a bug in DateDifferenceMBS class related to an overflow in January.
- Enabled allTouches in NSEventMBS class for macOS.
- Added touchesBeganWithEvent, touchesCancelledWithEvent, touchesEndedWithEvent and touchesMovedWithEvent events to CanvasGesturesMBS class.
- Fixed an issue in MBS Xojo SQL Plugin where an error message would be cut on the first character improperly encoded.
- Improved MBS Xojo SQL Plugin to better return error messages if the ODBC driver provided them with ASCII instead of UTF16/32 encoding.
- Added willShowContextualMenu and didCloseContextualMenu events to 34 controls.
Download:
monkeybreadsoftware.de/xojo/download/plugin/Prerelease/ or
from DropBox.
Or ask us to be added to our shared DropBox folder.
You can subscribe to our Xojo mailing list to get notified for new pre-release and release versions.
New in this prerelease of the 24.1 plugins:
- Updated our headers for NetSNMP library.
- Added AVSpeechSynthesizerMBS and related classes.
- Changed SetLicenseKey in DynaPDFMBS class to raise exception if you call it in debug mode after calling SetLicenseKeyGlobal to suggest you to remove the SetLicenseKey call.
- Updated DynaPDF to version 4.0.83.242.
- Changed Bounds, GPTS and LPTS in DynaPDFMeasureMBS to be double.
Download:
monkeybreadsoftware.de/xojo/download/plugin/Prerelease/ or
from DropBox.
Or ask us to be added to our shared DropBox folder.
You can subscribe to our Xojo mailing list to get notified for new pre-release and release versions.
For a few years now it is possible to load an extension both in MBS Xojo SQL Plugin using SQLite as well as into Xojo's built-in SQLiteDatabase. But now we have something new for you here:
You can register custom functions to use in the SQLite database and define them in Xojo.
(more)
New in this prerelease of the 24.1 plugins:
- Added MovableByWindowBackground property for OverlayMBS class.
- Added requestWriteOnlyAccessToEvents, requestFullAccessToReminders and requestFullAccessToEvents to EKEventStoreMBS class.
- Updated dyncall library to version 1.4.
- Added new kCallMode* constants for DeclareFunctionMBS class.
- Changed MidiThruConnectionMBS class to be a subclass of MidiObjectMBS class.
- Added Find method to MidiThruConnectionMBS class.
- Changed kOptionLibrarySeparator in SQLConnectionMBS class to be a shared method to return ";" on Windows and ":" on macOS/Linux.
- Improved Data Detector example to include a contextual menu routine for showing actions based on NSDataDetectorMBS class.
- Fixed a problem with MacBase and CURL plugin loading on older macOS versions.
- Implemented IgnoreMouseClicks for Windows in OverlayMBS class. Allows mouse clicks to fall through to window behind.
- Fixed PortAudioStreamRecorderMBS to enforce sample format paFloat32 when using OpenStream() to prevent errors later.
- Added SQLiteFunctionMBS class to add custom SQLite functions for SQLite database connections.
- Added Path property to InternalSQLiteLibraryMBS module.
- Added NWPathMonitorMBS class for macOS/iOS to monitor available network.
- Added NSProcessInfoPowerStateDidChangeNotification for NSProcessInfoMBS class.
- Added NWPathMBS, NWEndPointMBS and NWInterfaceMBS classes.
- Updated SQLite to version 3.45.1.
- Added new variant of FromDiff method in JSONMBS class with KeyToCopy parameter to copy primary keys.
Download:
monkeybreadsoftware.de/xojo/download/plugin/Prerelease/ or
from DropBox.
Or ask us to be added to our shared DropBox folder.
You can subscribe to our Xojo mailing list to get notified for new pre-release and release versions.
Our Xojo conference in Andernach comes closer week by week and we are very excited to host you all in our homeland.
On the last weekend I walked to the Krahnenberg outlook over Andernach. That is a hike you could do if you have an hour or two of spare time in Andernach. The shortest and steepest way is 1.3 km from the Einstein Hotel, but a longer 2.4 km way over road is available or a 2.0 km way along the Rhine and up through the forest.
(more)
Recently we got a client with a special problem. A scanned paper with a signature has a lot of unused space around. The scan shows a bit of dust and dirt. People have greasy fingers, the flatbed scanner is not clean and the paper not perfect white. We have to clean it up and got a problem: The normal trim method in GMImageMBS class would remove some of the space, but a dust piece on the scan may prevent it from removing a bigger part.
We found a relative easy fix. We scale down the image to a much smaller size and all the dust points disappear. Now we can check for bounding box of the content and apply the found rectangle to the original picture.
(more)
When you use our chart classes in the MBS Xojo ChartDirector Plugin, you have the chance to have more than one X axis and/or more than one Y axis. When doing this, there are a few things to think about and some little things
The second axes for X and Y are basically always there, but only shown when you start configuring them. For example you may start with setting a title for the second axis:
// Add a title to the secondary (right) y axis
call c.yAxis2.setTitle("Throughtput (MBytes)")
Now you may also want to set some colors:
// Set the axis, label and title colors for the primary y axis to red (&hc00000)
// to match the first data set
c.yAxis.setColors(&hc00000, &hc00000, &hc00000)
(more)
Recently a client asked how to give an image shown in a Xojo web app a hover effect. Basically a few WebImageView controls show various pictures and you need to pick one. When the mouse moves over the images, we like to highlight the image by making it darker or brighter.
We quickly thought how to do it:
- in Xojo directly, there is no property and no MouseEnter/MouseExit events. But the server round trip would make this quite slow anyway.
- in JavaScript would be faster and run in the browser. Like install mouse event handler and then swap out the image for a darker version.
- in CSS is the best as the browser does it and we benefit from any graphics acceleration. And CSS doesn't need to swap the image and just darken it with an effect.
(more)