Working with menus

In this tutorial you learn how to set up the Clarion menu and override with PowerToolbar.  Please note that the menu themes do NOT work in Clarion 7 and the PowerToolbar template automatically turns them off.  See the Limitations topic for more information.  As of Build 2.0.163 menus can again be themed in Clarion 7 and Clarion 8.

When working with the Clarion menu you must obey the following limitations:

If you choose to override the main Clarion menu you can NOT have (merging) menus in any child windows.

All items in menu must have a Use-variable set

All font colors must be COLOR:NONE

Width must be "default" on all items

Height must be "default" on all items

Top level menu-items is not supported

Runtime added top level-menus is not supported

The finished application for this tutorial can be found at: Clarion6\3rdParty\Examples\PowerToolbar\MenusTutorial.app

Create a new application

Add the global PowerToolbar template

See Adding the templates

Add AppFrame

Double-click the Main(Todo) procedure to bring up the "Select Procedure Type" dialog.

Select "Frame - Multiple Document Main Menu"

Create the window

Click the Window button

Select "Application Main MDI Frame" and click OK. This will bring up the window formatter.

Create a toolbar

Select the menu-item "Toolbar -> New Toolbar"

Populate PowerToolbar control

Click the "Control Template" toolbutton

Choose the template "POToolbar - Toolbar Control"

Click somewhere inside the Clarion toolbar or Window to place the PowerToolbar-control.

Double-click the menu band to open the menu editor

Place use variable on all items

You must make sure that all items in the menu has a use-variable.

In the default menu there is one separator without use-variable. Set it to ?Sep1

Add submenu

Add a submenu under the "Help"-menu by clicking

Make sure the new item get's a use-variable. By default it doesn't.

Add sub-menu item

Add a submenu-item under the newly created submenu by clicking

Set icon

Select the "Appearance"-tab

Choose your favourite icon (16x16) by clicking the "..." button next to the Icon-prompt.

Click the "Close" button to accept the menu changes and get back to the window formatter.

Right-click the PowerToolbar control, and select "Actions"

Select the "Menu" tab

Click the "Override main Clarion menu"-checkbox

Compile run your application

Make sure the icon for the item we added shows. If it's missing or placed on the wrong item, you probably got a menu-item without use-variable.