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The LA Fox Developer Newsletter
March 1996
VFP Tip of the Month .
More SCREEN and
_SCREEN Tips
By Rick Schummer, Contributing Editor

(Ed. Note: Reprinted with permission from the February issue of the Detroit Area Fox User Group newsletter.)

There is not a couple weeks that go by on CompuServe’s FoxForum when I see the question "I have added an icon to my .FoxPro EXE using ADDICON.APP, but when I run the app and minimize it I get the Fox Head, how can I fix this?”. In a very short time one or more developers will answer this question (and hopefully those who have asked it in the past return favors by jumping in). Microsoft defaults all form and SCREEN icons to the Fox logo, and unless you change it they will continue to get free advertisement and your customers will ask “where did you get that cute fox icon for my application?”.

The ADDICON.APP (found in the main FoxPro directory) attaches the application icon to your .EXE. This allows the icon to be available when adding the application to a program group in Windows. It does not insure that the application will have the icon assigned to the main FoxPro Screen.

In FoxPro 2.x for Windows there is a command that is a must in every application main program that looks something like:

MODIFY WINDOW SCREEN MINIMIZE;
ICON FILE "f:\payroll\prapp.icon"

This command will insure that the application will have a specified icon when it is minimized by the users. If you do not include the MINIMIZE option then there is no reason to include the ICON FILE option.

There are many other fun things that can be included in a MODIFY WINDOW SCREEN. Please note that MODIFY WINDOW SCREEN is a FoxPro for Windows and MAC command and is not supported by FoxPro for DOS or UNIX. Also note that “SCREEN” cannot be abbreviated to four characters like most FoxPro keywords and that there are some issues with app icons and Windows 95 (see Running FoxPro 2.6 Apps Under Windows 95, October 1995 issue). It seems that the screen icon is not supported properly and results can vary.

In Visual FoxPro we use some of the properties of the _SCREEN object. The following setting gives the same result5 as the MODIFY WINDOW command in 2.x:

SCREEN.Icon = "f:\payroll\prapp.icon"

I have noticed some problems with VFP _SCREEN icons running under Windows for Workgroups, but they perform without issue under Windows 95. For some reason (a bug
perhaps) icons will not display correctly, they just display as a black outlined box.

There is no ADDICON.APP included with Visual FoxPro. The icon is attached to the .EXE during the build. To specify which icon to include in the application see the Project Information (Ctrl+J) dialog and click on the “Attach Icon to .EXE” checkbox, and select the project’s icon.

Out and About (Con't from page 3)

call 800/545-8240. The last notice I received stated that all information at the conference will be delivered at an advanced or technical level.

DevCon Rising from the Ashes? We’re not trying to start any rumors here, but Bill Anderson sent me a blurb he found while messing around on the VFOX Forum:
Subject: DevCon - Msg Number: 48372
From: Carl Warner 72567,3372
To:
Bob Thomsen 71023,3273
Forum: VFOX Sec: 01-lnfo(non-technical) Date: 10-Mar-96 12:58

If you have access to the Web, try

http://www.microsoft.com/FoxPro/devcon.htm

As of today (so you and others don’t waste your time), the official word there is:


The 1996 Microsoft FoxPro Developer’s Conference has not yet been announced. When the date, location, and schedule for the 1996 Microsoft FoxPro Developer’s Conference is announced, this page will be updated with complete information about the conference.

This page will also contain information about other conferences of interest to FoxPro developers as they are announced.


I have yet to see “other conferences” mentioned on that page, and have no idea how anyone would go about making sure their conference is mentioned on that page. Who are you going to call? I left a feedback message concerning at least mentioning FoxTeach there, but I guess my message was filed the same place MS puts InfoWeek articles.

Also awaiting DevCon ‘96.
==Carl

What was That Number? As if Apple didn’t have enough problems. Customers dialing into Apple’s help line (800/SOS- APPL)have found that if they accidentally dial a zero instead of the letter “0”, they get connected to a commercial phone sex line.
(Cont, page 6)
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