Trading Blox has an optional Auxiliary Window text area that is built-in and available.  By default, the Auxiliary Window is closed when the software is installed.  It will remain closed unless the user opens it, or has it open when Trading Blox is closed.

 

When the Auxiliary Window is opened from a closed state, it will appear in the last location where it was placed.  This text window only needs to be active for it to receive text information during a simulation test.  

 

When this window is active and open, it can be a fixed text display, a floating text display, or it can be docked to the right side of

the Trading Blox main screen.

 

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Open Auxiliary Window:

By default, Trading Blox Auxiliary Window is not active or displayed after a new Trading Blox installation.  If the user opens and then later closes the Auxiliary Window prior to exiting Trading Blox, it will be closed when Trading Blox is started again.

 

To open the Auxiliary Window, click on the Auxiliary Window button in the Auxiliary Window group located in the Main Menu's Tools tab. This next image shows the Home Menu's Tools tab , and the Auxiliary Window group where its Open Window button is located:

The Auxiliary Window can also be displayed by the Trading Blox script function OpenAuxiliaryWindow. As long as there is an active presence that the Auxiliary Window is on or near Trading Blox,text sent to it will be received.  A hidden Auxiliary Window is considered to be active.

 

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Auxiliary Window Active:

When the Auxiliary Window is not open, it can be opened by clicking on the Main Menu's Auxiliary Window button named, Open Window.  It can also be displayed by a system blox that is designed to execute the OpenAuxiliaryWindow function.

 

When the Auxiliary Window appears on the Main Screen, it will display as a Docked area (see next image.)  

The above docked Auxiliary Window shows the text area open.  It also shows it is above an inactive Docked Log Window.  

 

The  option that collapses the text area and adds a Open Log button is the Auto-Hide Button that looks like a Pin.  The Auxiliary Window shows the Auto-Hide Pin Button shows the Pin's Point is down, which is the Auto-Hide Off position.  When an Auxiliary Window is active, it will receive text information regardless of its Hidden or Open state.

 

To open an Auxiliary Window when its When the Auto-Hide option shows the text area hidden, click the button to open the text area.  To keep the text area open, change the direction of the Auto-Hide Pin to point down.

 

An Auxiliary Window can be closed and made inactive by clicking on the "X" button at the far right side of the window's Title Bar area.  It can also be closed by a blox script that calls the function: closeAuxiliaryWindow script.

 

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Auxiliary Window Messages:

Text information can be sent to the Log Window by adding the PRINT function to "text character statement".

 

Text information is created for the Auxiliary Window by the person who captures information from a simulation that is converts into a line of text information.  When the scripting process finishes the message, it sends the information to an indexed row in a STRING series.  

 

When the simulation reaches a stage where it is ready to send the completed message, it knows it must be first sent to a text type row in a STRING series.  Each text STRING series has many rows where it can save many messages.  The number of the messages it can handled, is determined by the person who is creating the messages.

 

At some point the logic in the blox will decide it is time to send the stored messages to the Auxiliary Window.  Sending all the stored messages happens in one step when the function SetAuxiliaryWindowText(stringSeries) is executed.

 

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Auxiliary Window Floating & Docking Mode:

To change the Auxiliary Window from Docked to Floating, the Auto-Hide option must be disabled (Pin pointing down).  

 

To undock the Auxiliary Window so it can be moved, click any place on the Title Bar area and hold the mouse button down.  With the mouse held down, move the Auxiliary Window a little.  As soon as it is moved, it will change size as it pops out of docked mode.  

 

Continue to move the Auxiliary Window with your mouse pressed down until you have it where you would like it.  If you change your mind about its location, click on the Title Bar again and move it to another location.

 

Once the Auxiliary Window is where you want it, you can change is size and shape just like you change other dialogs or software displays.

 

Docking the Auxiliary Window again is simple.  Grab the Auxiliary Window Title Bar area with the mouse and hold it down.  With the mouse held down, move the window until the mouse pointer is over the main screen area.  As soon as Trading Blox recognizes the mouse is over the main screen,  it will display the Docking direction and destination locators.  As the mouse nears a Docking Location Direction boxed arrow, the screen color will show a translucent blue shade.  Release the mouse button and the window will dock to the location the boxed arrow button that your mouse triggered.

 

These locating arrows are used to dock the floating window to the right side, or the bottom side of the main screen.  The first window to be docked, will be the window that is closer to the edge where it is docked.  The second window to dock, will be above or to the left of the window that is docked on that side.  Each of the two text area windows can be docked on the same side, or each can be docked on different sides.  Both can be floating at the same time.

 

A video in the Trading Blox Forum: Blox MarketPlace, shows how these options work :

Docked-Undocked-Floating Windows

 

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