Hi there I've encountered a similar problem as mentioned in the following thread: http://groups.google.com/group/comp.soft-sys.ptolemy/browse_thread/thread/dc4c136eb6870d10/75e79a2afd7cc9ab
Though using Kepler, I needed to modify the underlying Ptolemy framework in order to allow custom input boxes in actor dialogs. But instead of hacking the ptolemy.gui.Query and ptolemy.actor.gui.PtolemyQuery classes whenever I'd need another custom query box, I modified those two classes (and added classes/interfaces) to make it a bit more flexible. In order to get a new query box into Ptolemy, you need to modify the following places: - ptolemy.gui.Query ~ set(String,String) ~ getStringValue(String) in those two methods the type of custom query chooser, e.g., QueryColorChooser is used to determine how to obtain/set the string representation. - ptolemy.actor.gui.PtolemyQuery ~ addStyledEntry(Settable) here the type of Parameter defines what query chooser is added for the attribute, e.g., a QueryColorChooser in case of a ColorAttribute. To decouple this a bit, I've come up with an interface called "CustomQueryBoxParameter", to be implemented by types derived from Parameter that need a custom query box. The interface consists of only one method: javax.swing.Box createQueryBox(PtolemyQuery query, Settable att) This method returns a custom query box (fully configured), based on the current query and attribute this query belongs to. This swing element contains all the necessary logic to manipulate the data, e.g., a button for popping up another dialog, etc. The addStyledEntry method of the PtolemyQuery class obtains a box from an attribute implementing CustomQueryBoxParameter and attaches it (via the _addPair method). The query box being returned, is a custom class derived from javax.swing.Box, which implements another interface called "SettableQueryChooser". This interface is used in the set/getStringValue methods of ptolemy.gui.Query to set/get the current string value. The actual query chooser class turns that into whatever internal representation it uses. This interface avoids having to add new logic to the Query class, whenever a new custom QueryChooser is implemented. Since I'm apparently not the only user who encountered this problem, I'd like to contribute my code (which will hopefully trickle down to Kepler at one stage, in case it gets accepted). Not exactly sure how contributions work around here. Note: my original post *with* attachments didn't come through apparently (never showed up in the Google group), you can find my original post including the attachments on my homepage: http://www.scms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/downloads/ptolemy/custom_query_boxes/ There are several files available for download from this web page: - ptolemy-patch.zip contains patches for the Query/PtolemyQuery classes (run against subversion repository August 14, 2008) - ptolemy-additional_classes.zip additional classes/interfaces necessary for my proposed changes - examples-classes.zip contains a simple actor that uses a custom query box with a button that pops up a JOptionPane for the user to enter some text; this is just to demonstrate how the slightly modified framework would work - examples.kar a kepler archive - I know, this is not exactly the right place, but I thought some Kepler people/developers read this mailing list as well and might be interested in this Hopefully, my ramblings made some sense, otherwise the code hopefully speaks for itself. ;-) Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cs.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted to the ptolemy-hackers mailing list. Please send administrative mail for this list to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]