the '$' sign

[ConvertFromOldNGs]

by Anonymous >> Tue, 27 Jul 2004 2:33:00 GMT

Quick inquiry,
what does the '$" mean?. I've noticed it in front of some variable strings in the erewhon investment example but i cant figure out what they mean. Jade help isnt very clear on it.

cheers

eg ...if listbox.itemText[itemIndex] = $ItemsForSale then ...

eg ...caption := $Edit & " " & caption;

[ConvertFromOldNGs]

by cnwjhp1 >> Tue, 27 Jul 2004 2:54:10 GMT

They indicate translatable strings. From the Schema Browser, choose Schema>Strings.

Cheers,
John P

[ConvertFromOldNGs]

by epeachey >> Tue, 27 Jul 2004 2:59:00 GMT

They'll be 'translatable strings'. There should be details on this topic in the help files. They're so that if you develop a multi lingual system you can have different values for the same symbol for different locales. The same goes for your forms.

They're defined from the Schema->Strings option.

You can insert them in your methods (use shift-F6 to bring up a dialog to select a string if you can't quite remember its name).

The $ symbol is also used to prefix 'Formats' in your code - if you want to define date, time, currency and number formats for use with say Decimal::userNumberFormat etc.

You can find brief details of a string or format in your code by positioning the cursor in the word e.g. in the middle of '$Edit' in your method text and pressing F11.

Be aware that there is an overhead in retrieving the value of a translatable string at runtime.