MPI Property Inspector

This is a document in progress.

The PI module is the heart of MPI, The Property Inspector lets you cange the properties of SuperCard objects quickly and contextually. As with the rest of MPI the PI reflects the current selection.

Property Inspector Movie

Open the PI with nothing selected in the top window and it opens in card view, letting you edit the card properties. Switch to editing the background and The PI moves to the background view. Select and object and it switches to the view of that object. Select more than one object of the same kind and the PI allows you to set properties for all the selected objects at once, the PI also indicates you cannot edit properties that cannot be the same for more than one object, number, part etc.

Select more than one object of different kinds and the PI switches to the sizes card, allowing you to resize and align the objects. You can go to the sizes card for objects at any time, alt clciking objects or choosing size from the popup button at the top right of the PI window. If you change the selection while on the sizes card the PI will want to follow your selection contextually, to avoid this you can use the 'pushpin' at the topleft of the sizes card, sticking the pin into the card will keep you on the sizes card.

When in card or background view you can move to the Project, Window or Globals properties view from the popup button at the top right.

The Project and Windows views allow you see and to change there properties. The Globals view is a tabbed interface with 6 sections, allowing to to change 66 SuperCard global properties.

As well as being a powerful property editor the PI is a SuperTalk dictionary, shift clickinging on any of the buttons or labels will open the SuperCard Help and then the SuperCard Language Guide at the card for the property clicked.

The Object, Card, Background, window views share some features. At the top of each, left to right we see:

Kind, which tells you where you are, fields where you can edit the Name, Number and ID if appropriate . Naming with buttons when you edit the name if you press Enter or Return to set the name of a button, holding the shift-key down will set the show name to true at the same time.

A Nice feature on the window Card of the PI is the 'Register as template' button, this open a Window Template dialog, which lets you save a template for new windows. This links to the New Window submenu in MPI's File menu, where you can choose the style of your new window. Window Template Dialog Window [in a new window].

New Window menu item [in a new window]

Selecting multiple objects of the same sort will let you edit the common properties.

Selecting multiple objects of different sorts takes you to the size card on the PI module, with fields to edit the common properties, and tools to size and align objects. Option clicking an object will also take you to the Sizes card, saving a trip to the Edit... popup.

The Sizes card of the PI has several nice features, align buttons at the bottoms, with a distribute feature. And that odd looking pushpin at the top left of the palette. Sticking the pin into the palette keeps you on the Sizes card when you change selection, i.e. the PI doesn't jump back to the properties card for that type of object. Stéphane has made the pushpin into a visual joke and comment on tool icons.