Menu Items List |
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A list of Menu Items appears on the Edit Menu Definition dialog, as well as on the Edit Menu Item dialog if the Menu Item is a Sub-menu. It operates the same way in either place, since a Sub-menu Item is essentially a Menu-within-a-Menu.
Menu items are actually "Item" records linked to the Menu (or sub-menu item), so this list shows those linked item records. As with most places where record lists are manipulated, the typical functions are available to Add, Insert, Edit, Copy, Delete, and Move items in the list. In addition, there are a few special functions as described below.
The item list shows the Condition and Text of the items, but depending on the item there's no guarantee that either one of these will be filled in. So putting in good Notes for the items is recommended.
Note that the text in some columns may be truncated (with "..." at the end). This is done automatically to limit the column widths and keep long text from making the other columns hard to find. (Even if the columns or the whole dialog is enlarged, it won't show these fields any longer here.)
Menu Item Order
When a Menu Definition is processed, the items are processed one after another in the order they appear in this list. Any Sub-menu items are "recursively" processed -- that is, all of a sub-menu's sub-items are processed before moving on to the next item at the same level (more is explained about "levels" below). While this in itself doesn't always make a difference, the order of items in a Menu Definition determines the order they're added to the menu (assuming the item isn't just a Rename or Remove item).
Expand Sub-menus
As mentioned above, a Sub-menu item is like a Menu within a Menu. As such, a sub-menu has a list of items of its own that are relative to that sub-menu. This can include another sub-menu, and so forth, resulting in multiple "levels" of sub-menus, each with their own list of items.
By default, the Edit Menu dialog or Edit Item dialog for a sub-menu will only show the items linked directly to it -- i.e. the current "level" of items.
However if you check the Expand Sub-menus box, all sub-menus at or below the current level are expanded into a tree-like list. This allows you to see all items in the entire Menu Definition (or current sub-menu) in a single list. To make it easier to read, each level will have a "--->" prefix and will be indented according to the depth, like a tree view. Also, each level will be shaded differently.
You'll notice that some functions are not available in expanded mode. You can't Insert or Move items, because it can't handle the multiple-level complexities of this. However you can Copy items from any level (the new copies will always be placed in the current level). You can also Edit an item from any level, which is the primary reason for expanding the list -- you can quickly locate the item of interest and edit it directly without going through each sub-menu above that. (Don't forget that double-clicking an item in the list also does the same thing as Edit).
Import and Export Items
These functions will import or export any selected items to a CSV (text) file. The main purpose of this is to copy the items to a different Menu Definition or to a different level (sub-menu) of the Menu Definition. You can also export commonly used sets of items, for importing to Menu Definitions you create later. Basically it's like doing a copy/paste of items, but going through a file instead of just the clipboard. Note that it's not the same as the import/export function for a complete Menu Definition -- it's strictly for copying or moving selected items. However if an item is a Sub-menu, then all of the items contained in that sub-menu are also exported (recursively to any level), and of course they would be imported intact the same way.
When exporting, any items visible in the list can be exported (even if Expanded as described above), but they must all be of the same expansion level. You cannot select some items in one level and some items in another level to be exported at the same time.
When importing, all items imported are placed in the current level (regardless of expansion). For instance if you're editing a sub-menu, then all imported items are added to that sub-menu. If you're editing the Menu Definition (the top level), they are added to the end of the definition. Careful manipulation of importing and exporting items allows you to move items around between levels, for instance to move some items to a higher or lower sub-menu level.
Additional Topics:
Advanced Customizations Overview & other topics