Develop Reference

How to select multiple elements in a Revit drawing

I'm trying to create a "Multi-Select" method in Revit (for 2016/2017) where the users can select specific parameters of instances contained within a drawing (like Nominal Diameter, Pipe Type and so on), and it will select all the instances within the drawing based on their selections. First, screen shot:
Let's predicate this with the fact that this window is created dynamically based on contents of the drawing. Nothing gets put in this window unless there is an element in the drawing that contains/meets one or more of these parameters.
So, ideally, when I Click the DO IT! button, I would like it to select all of the elements in the drawing that have meet any of these parameters. I can filter through this window and find all of my selections - now I just don't know what do with the selections.
I've looked through the Revit.chm and source and found the Selection namespace and class. There are functions like:
PickObject(ObjectType objectType);
that seem like they would be what I want, but I don't know if it's REALLY what I need. Furthermore, if that IS, in fact, what I'm looking for, I don't know the syntax of how to use it.
A little code:
I have a method that collects all of the users' selections:
private List<CheckBox> GetUserFilterPrefs()
{
//CYCLES THROUGH ALL THE PANELS AND BOXES IN THE WINDOW
return lstCheckBox;
}
Now I want to create my EventHandler for btnDoIt_Click...
I started it, but I'm walking in the dark on this part.
private void btnDoIt_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
int itr = 0;
GetUserFilterPrefs();
List<Reference> lstRefs = new List<Reference>();
foreach (CheckBox cb in lstCheckBox)
{
if (lstElts[itr].Name == cb.Name)
{
//HOW DO I SELECT ALL ITEMS LIKE THE GIVEN ELEMENT
//THAT ARE RELATED TO THE CHECKBOX SELECTION??
}
itr +=1;
}
I'll obviously keep looking around; but if anyone knows a way, or can point me in the right direction, it would be massively helpful!
THANKS!!!

The PickObject function that you've found is one that asks the user to select an object in the model. Based on your description, that is not what you are looking for.
The function you need is:
SetElementIds(ICollection<ElementId> elementIds)
It is also part of the Selection class. This will highlight the desired elements in the model. To clear the selection in the model, pass an empty List as your argument. Passing null will cause an exception to be thrown.
To focus on the elements, you need the function:
UIDocument.ShowElements
There are a number of overloads for this function. Note that none if the elements are in the currently open view, Revit will attempt to find the best view for you, a task that it generally performs very poorly if there are many views in the model.

PickElement prompts the user for interactive element selection, which is not what you are after.
The one and only way to programmatically access elements in the Revit database is to use a filtered element collector:
http://thebuildingcoder.typepad.com/blog/about-the-author.html#5.9

Updating The .Text of the TrayNotifyIcon

I'm currently using the .Text of the TrayNotifyIcon to display a statusdisplay when the user has the mouse over it (for a percentual completion of a process)
Thus I just set: TrayNotifyIcon.Text to the appropriate % of completion.
Example (the following code is part of a code I use where I create a new thread which sets in the subprocess variable if it is completed or not and also how many % completion are. The code below shall display as the TrayNotifyIcon.Text how many % of the subprocess are completed with updates every second):
while (subprocess.NotCompleted)
{
TrayNotifyIcon.Text = "TextToUpdateTo....." + subprocess.percent.ToString() + "% completion";
Thread.Sleep(1000);
}
Now I've seen that it only updates the display whenever I move the mouse and does not update it as soon as I set .Text appropriately.
Thus my quesiton is is there any way to make it so that I can tell the system to update the text that is being displayed?

The system displays the hint text when the mouse is hovered over the notification icon. This text is not expected to be dynamic. The display of the text is handled by the system. When it wants to display the hint, it queries the icon for the text, and then displays it. It will not go back and check if the text has been changed, and there is no mechanism to inform the system that the text has been changed and should be updated. This is a feature of the shell (Shell_NotifyIcon) rather than anything in the .net libraries.
So, using TrayNotifyIcon in its vanilla form, there is nothing you can do to change this behaviour. If you really want dynamic update of hint text you will have to suppress the system drawn hint (by setting Text to an empty string) and drawing your own hint window. You'd need to detect the mouse hovering over the icon, and also detect when it leaves the icon.
Frankly, I don't think that this is really a very good piece of UX design. If I were you I would find a different way to let the user receive this feedback.

Apply Input Mask for a ToolStripComboBox C#

I was just wondering if anyone has come across how to apply an input mask for a Tool Strip Combo Box in C#?
My drop down box gets populated over time with IP addresses, and I would like to restrict what the users are able to write in (Ex: can only input 3 '.'s, only numbers, etc).
So if anyone is able to help out I would really appreciate it!
Thanks in advance.
Edit
My design has changed so I now need to have a ToolStripComboBox

You could try catching the KeyUp event, then check that the input is valid. If not revert it to the last valid input. You would probably want to do something similar with the Validating event (make sure CausesValidation is true).
Another option would be to create a MaskedTextBox and place it so it covers the text box portion of the drop down menu. You would then need to wire up the events so the two form controls remained synced.
You could also look into the ErrorProvider class.
There are a couple of other ways (like a timer which runs ever .3 seconds), but those are usually performance hogs or difficult to maintain.
Update for regular expression comment:
If I was to do this I might use a regular expression or I might manually parse the string.
Either way the KeyUp and Validating events is where I would check the validation of the control. The KeyUp event gives me the option to check as they type while the Validating event allows me to validate when the control loses focus. Which you use will depend on what you want the user experience to be.
If you do not use the KeyUp event to validate, you could add a timer which runs 5 seconds after the last key press. This way the control would not have to lose focus for the error to show.
Update for edited question and comment:
You could not use Format event as your question was on how to format user input, not how things are added to the list. As such that solution does not work with ToolStripComboBox or with ComboBox.
After reading the documentation for ToolStripControlHost, you might be able to cast ToolStripComboBox to ComboBox. If not then you could use the ToolStripControlHost to place the ComboBox onto your form. - This is incorrect or unnecessary, please see update below the quote.
ToolStripControlHost is the abstract base class for ToolStripComboBox, ToolStripTextBox, and ToolStripProgressBar. ToolStripControlHost can host other controls, including custom controls, in two ways:
Construct a ToolStripControlHost with a class that derives from Control. To fully access the hosted control and properties, you must cast the Control property back to the actual class it represents.
Extend ToolStripControlHost, and in the inherited class's default constructor, call the base class constructor passing a class that derives from Control. This option lets you wrap common control methods and properties for easy access in a ToolStrip.
Use the ToolStripControlHost class to host your customized controls or any other Windows Forms control.
To customize a ToolStripItem, derive from ToolStripControlHost and create a custom implementation. You can override methods such as OnSubscribeControlEvents to handle events raised by the hosted controls, and you can put custom functionality into properties to enhance the hosted control.
Update:
According to the ToolStripComboBox documentation you can access the underlying ComboBox through ToolStripComboBox's ComboBox property.
This is why I usually read the documentation on a control before I use it. I might not understand it, but at least I will have an idea what to look for. :)

You should create Format event like this:
private void comboBox1_Format(object sender, ListControlConvertEventArgs e)
{
e.Value = GetFullIpFormat((string)e.Value);
}
And here is code for formating values:
string GetFullIpFormat(string value)
{
string[] ip = new string[4];
for (int i = 0; i < ip.Length; i++)
{
ip[i] = GetIpPart(i, value);
}
return string.Format("{0:###}.{1:###}.{2:###}.{3:###}", ip[0], ip[1], ip[2], ip[3]);
}
string GetIpPart(int partNumber, string ip)
{
string result = "000";
int iLen = 3;
ip = ip.Replace(".", "");
int iStart = partNumber * iLen;
if (ip.Length > iStart)
{
result = ip.Substring(iStart);
if (result.Length > iLen)
{
result = result.Substring(0, iLen);
}
}
return result;
}
This will do formating for you.
Alternativly you can check input on same event for numbers.
This will do the job for you, happy coding! :)

Custom event on object to change button state

I have 3 buttons on my Data Entry form, OK, APPLY, CANCEL.
This form is used to edit a doctor's details, things like first name, phone # etc...
I have one object doctorObj which at any given time is either empty (a new doctor) or an object pulled from a Linq query.
I deep clone the doctorObj to EditCopyDoctor which is of the same type but used for form editing (so if Cancel is hit, the database do not need to update).
What I want to achieve is observe the EditCopyDoctor for changes against the original doctorObj so
If(doctor.Changed() && doctor.IsNotNew)
{
ApplyButton.Enabled = true;
}
else
{
ApplyButton.Enabled = false;
}
So I thought writting an event to trigger when something changed on EditCopyDoctor is the best way to do it but I'm not sure how.
I can of course put the ApplyButton.Enabled code in the TextChanged events from the form but I was wondering if there are any quicker ways to do this, I don't really want to do this as there are 10+ textbox and other controls.

Since your "Doctor" type sounds like it's generated by LINQ to SQL/Entities you should find that it already implements the INotifyPropertyChanged interface. Therefore, you should just need to watch the PropertyChanged event and act accordingly.

How bad is the following snippet?

My question is simple: how bad is the following snippet of code? How would you do it?
CancelEventHandler _windowClosing;
private CancelEventHandler WindowClosing
{
set
{
clearEventHandlerList();
this.Closing += value;
_windowClosing = value;
/*
* if calling the method with null parameters,
* it will set up itself as the primary control on the Window
*/
_windowClosing(null,null);
}
get
{
return _windowClosing;
}
}
private readonly CancelEventHandler[] CONTROLS = null;
private int current = 0;
public InitializerForm()
{
InitializeComponent();
/*
* these are the handlers for the different controls,
* in the order of appereance to the user
*/
STATES = new CancelEventHandler[] { handler1, handler2, etc. };
WindowClosing = CONTROLS[0];
}
private void clearEventHandlerList()
{
foreach (CancelEventHandler c in CONTROLS)
{
this.Closing -= c;
}
}
private void handler1(object obj, CancelEventArgs e)
{
if (obj == null)
{
//hide every other control, but this one, also set up if necessary
}
else
{
//do something
WindowClosing = CONTROLS[++current]; // set the next control to show
e.Cancel = true;
}
}
The point would be that the code wouldn't close a form, but instead show another component on it, and the set the way to handle that (this is mobile platform, so clicking OK button on the top generates a closing event). This is because showing several forms (4 or 5) one after another to the user makes the app blink, and also very annoying, while replacing just components is much smoother. This model works, but seems very nasty, and I would like a cleaner way to handle this.
Update:
I updated the code sample so that variable names are somewhat speaky. Still, I'm convinced this is awful, (a) but not sure how much, and more importantly, (b) how to do it better.
Update 2:
So, it seems that the code is still a bit mysterious.
Now here's what the problem is:
I show the user a form, which instructs him what to do in several languages. He proceeds by clicking OK on the window. Next, I ask for his language, and then a few questions (where his/her GPS is, etc.) like this. After he could answer the questions (this shouldn't take more than a few seconds each), I show him a splash screen (I load stuff in a separate thread meanwhile), which has a picture. Showing these forms one after another makes the whole application start slow, and filled with UI lags.
Here's what I do to work around the lags: I put the content of the windows into panels, and put those panels one on another, and hide every one of them but the one that should be visible to the user. (current variable) Each of the windows does different things, so I need to change handler of the window closing event in addition. In this code the part which enables the panel is in the same function (handler1, handler2, etc.) with the part which handles the window closing event. If the arguments are null, it does the former, if it isn't (that means it was triggered by the user) it does the latter.
I need an extensible solution to this so that I can insert and remove dialogs anytime I want (the order and the pointers to the functions are stored in the CONTROLS field, and this seems to be very convenient, if you actually understand it. Although it is never easy to change the entire content of a form, there ought to be a simpler way to do this, as well a nicer one, that is what I'm looking for.
I hope this time I could explain how the model works.

I think it might be theoretically possible to make that code more delightfully diverting, perilously puckish, jovially jeopardous, cheerily chancy and unwarily whimsical but it would require some serious thought.

somehow your code makes me want to cry, i´m sorry. i read it twice and all i know about it is that it "doesStuff" with "STATES".
if you really want some help on this one you will have to work on it yourself first...

Use, XML! It's human-readable!
More seriously-
It seems like you're trying to create some sort of configuration wizard, so I'd start by researching that. Regarding your particular solution, I generally advocate very strongly against the "layered panel" approach. I do so because I maintain apps written by people who found this approach, or the related "hidden tabs on a tab control" approach, to be a good idea. It's not, and maintainers will curse your name for years to come.
That being said, what alternatives are there? Well, one alternative is what you've already dismissed because of its "flicker". I'd say that, in general, the flicker isn't that big of a deal for a quick and dirty application. It might be a good idea to make sure that your new window is called up before closing the old one, for example. (I'm assuming this is possible, I haven't developed on a mobile device.)
Another possibility might be a less-evil version of your layered panels. Instead of throwing a half-dozen panels into one form, create a separate user control for each wizard page and then add/remove the user controls to a containing form. This can avoid your flicker and will prove to be much easier to maintain because each page is in a different control. This might also ease any subsequent "Back" button functionality and make your data structures more naturally defined because those user controls will be associated with a specific logical bit of data. It's still not ideal, but it's probably good enough for a one-off solution.
A third technique, if you foresee extensive wizard modification as the product matures, might be to generalize the creation of your user controls by defining them in a more logical/declarative manner (e.g. via XML). If you dynamically generate sensible controls based on XML, then modifying the panels might be as easy as diving into your XML and doing something like:
<Questions>
<Question type="Text"> <!-- generate a textbox for the answer field -->
Favorite Color:
</Question>
<Question type="Number" range="0-255"> <!-- Maybe this is a spinner -->
The answer to life, the universe, and everything:
</Question>
</Questions>
That's just off the top of my head, and completely overkill for any one-off application, but it's a possibility.

Now, let me caveat this by saying this might work, but it may not be the answer to your real problem - that of a slow and unresponsive UI when you have a lot of forms. The real answer may be to just go ahead and do all separate forms, but have each form load its child forms in a background thread while the user is staring at the first form.
But assuming you're still set on this, I'd start off by making a separate class just to handle the Panel stacking/hierarchy. Call it PanelManager. You would instantiate the PanelManager and associate it with the main form, then add Panels to it (perhaps keyed to a String) and set the order. In the main form, have the closing handler call PanelManager.CloseCurrentPanel() and if there are no more Panels to show then it's time to close the main form.
Time for pseudo-code! Here's a quick idea for the class, i'll leave it to you to implement it:
public class PanelManager {
// constructor
public PanelManager (Form ownerForm);
// short-cut properties
public Panel this[int idx]
{ get; set; }
public int Index
{ get; set; }
// main functionality
public int AddPanel (Panel p);
public void SetPanelOrder (Panel p, int idx);
public void RemovePanel (Panel p);
public void RemovePanelAt (int idx);
// shows the first Panel
public void Show ();
// shows Panel[idx]
public void Show (int idx);
// adds the panel to the top of the stack and displays it
// returns the index of the panel
public int AddPanelAndShow (Panel p);
// hides the current panel, displays the one underneath it
// returns false if there are no more panels
public bool HideCurrentPanel ();
}
in the constructor for the main form, instantiate it by new PanelManager (this), then in the closing event handler, call panelManager.HideCurrentPanel () and then figure out whether or not you need to close it after that.