[Plib-devel] PUI/puAux Class Notes

[Fay J. F C. AAC/W. <joh...@eg...>]

Gentlemen,

	In putting Erik Hofmann's "puList" code into my private copy of
"puAux", I have come upon a couple of issues having to do with PUI classes.
I would appreciate any guidance anybody could give.

(1) With the new class, the total number of classes in PUI and puAux is now
30.  The bitmap that defines what class (puValue::type) has 32 bits; thus we
have space for exactly two more types of widget.  While this is not an
emergency yet, I can see it turning into one.  What should we do about it?
I see two alternatives:
	- Adopt SSG's style of typing.  This, I think, assigns the same bit
to two different classes if their parent classes differ.  Each class thus
has a unique bit pattern but not a unique bit.
	- Increase the number of bits available.  There is a non-portable
64-bit integer type, but the "P" in PLIB makes this a nonstarter.  The
alternative is to define a structure or an array, making the "getType" more
complicated.

(2) "puValue" in PUI has a "getTypeString" function that prints out the name
of the PUI class.  Is there a way to extend this to print out puAux class
names?  One could define a function pointer, initialize it to null in PUI,
and set it to point to a function in puAux in each constructor method in
puAux, but this strikes me as being extremely ugly.  Does anybody have an
alternative?

John F. Fay
joh...@eg...
850-729-6330