Behavior and Scripting

Applies to Self-Extracting, HTML Viewer, IE Browser publications.

The tab contains scripting tools to extend the normal behavior of your publications. It also lets you show a splash screen at publication startup and some default messages boxes called prompt messages.

User Scripts : the Script Manager

You can use scripting to customize your publications. HTML Executable's scripts are written in the HEScript language. These scripts are compiled during the compilation into p-code for faster execution at runtime (contrary to JavaScript). That's why scripts are separated from HTML pages and stored in a script manager. You can manage scripts using this tab.

Introduction to scripting with HEScript.

Each script that will be compiled into the script collection of the publication is listed. You have the name of the script and an optional description. Each script must have a unique name (similar to a namespace).

To add a new script, press Add and the following window will appear:

You first give a name to the script. Space and special characters are not allowed (only alphanumeric ones). The maximum length for a script name is 255 characters.

Then you can choose a template for your script. A script template is actually a blank script with some pre-defined procedures or functions called events. When a script is for example associated to a HTML page, the publication will call a pre-defined function when its related event occurs (when an HTML object is clicked for instance).

More information about pre-defined scripts, templates, UserMain and Macros

There are several templates available:

  • script for a HTML page: the new script is intended to work with a HTML page. You can then associate this script to its HTML page in the File Manager->File Properties->Scripting.
  • script for a security profile: this script is designed to be associated to a security profile. For instance it may be used to create some conditions (result of a Boolean function) for the security profile.
  • script for a custom HTML dialog: this script should control the associated custom HTML dialog box. For examples, the Favorite manager and the About box in publications are actually custom HTML dialog boxes.

Finally you can give an optional description to your script, but it is not used by HTML Executable at all.

Press OK to start your new script; the script editor will then be displayed to edit your new script:

You are not forced to edit your script right now. Just click Save to finish the script editing: you can see that the new script then appears in the script list.

More information about the script editor.

Notes:

  1. By default HTML Executable automatically adds a "UserMain" script when a project is created. This script is designed for your own use and contains some pre-defined global events related to the publication.
  2. Scripts may be associated to HTML pages, conditions of security profiles, etc... But you can also call HEScript functions from your HTML code (links) and even from JavaScript. More information is available here.
  3. Script are stored into the project file. No external file is required.

To edit a given script, select it in the list and press Edit. You can also double-click on it. The script editor will be displayed.

To remove a script, select it in the list and press Remove. Note that you can't remove the UserMain script.

To import/export a script, select it in the list and press XML. Then select Import/Export and you will be prompted to enter the filename for the XML file. Scripts are stored in the XML format so you can edit them with any XML editor (or even Notepad if you wish). When you import a script back, the script editor is displayed: press Save to import the script. Note that an imported script is automatically syntax-checked (this prevents possible script errors during the compilation of the publication).

Prompt Messages

This tab allows you to display message boxes, called also prompt Messages, to inform end users about what they are doing. HTML Executable allows you to show two prompt messages at different times of the publication execution: at the beginning and at the end.

Start Prompt Message

It is displayed immediately after the publication is launched. It prompts end users if they want to run your publication or not (Yes and No buttons are displayed). You should enter a text like this: "Welcome to my publication. This publication is designed for a large screen resolution. Do you want to continue?".

End Prompt Message

As soon as the publication is closed by end users, the latter will display this message box and then exit. You should use it to thank end users like "Thank you for having read my publication! More information at: http://www.mywebsite.com.".

Notes:

  1. Leaving the fields blank will disable the display of these message boxes.
  2. To put a carriage-return–line-feed between “Line 1” and “Line 2", use /§, like "Line1/§Line2".

Splash Screen

During their initialization state, publications can show a splash screen (a picture shortly displayed at the beginning) and/or a "Please wait..." dialog box. The splash screen is useful if you wish to display your company's logo or something related to your publication's contents, while the dialog box informs your end users that the publication is being started. Because the initialization phase can take some seconds on old computers, this dialog box informs your end users that the publication is loading and prevents them from immediately trying to launch the publication again. The dialog box can also display a progress indicator.

To enable the splash screen, just specify the picture file to be used for the splash screen (absolute path) and set how long it should be displayed (generally 3-4 seconds). You can also allow end users to close the splash screen by clicking on it (recommended). Note that these two options are only available in some cases.

The "Please wait..." dialog box is available in two forms:

  • a text form: it will display the text of your choice, something like "Loading publication, please wait...". To change the text displayed, use the Localization tab and modify this resource string: SLoadingPublication.
     
  • an image form: it will display a picture in JPEG format which is actually the one of the splash screen. In this case, the splash screen is displayed immediately; but you cannot set how long it should be displayed.

If you do not want to display this dialog box, then enable "No initialization dialog at startup".

Enable display a progress indicator to show a progress bar during the loading process; note that this feature is not compatible with the dialog box in an image form (this option will be disabled if you turn the progress indicator on).

Important: only splash screens in JPEG format are supported!

Notes:

  1. a Self-Extracting publication will actually display your splash screen during the file extraction process (optionally with the progress meter) while other publication types display it immediately at startup. So for SFX publications, there is no option to set up the display delay, i.e. the splash screen will be shown until the last file has been extracted.
  2. please try to use small splash screens: large splash screens may take some "long" seconds to be drawn because the JPEG data needs first to be decompressed.
  3. the splash screen file is not stored in the project file. It should be available as an external file when the publication is being compiled. Path variables like [PROJECTPATH] are allowed.

System HTML Pages

All dialog boxes displayed by publications are actually HTML pages acting as custom HTML dialogs. These pages are called System HTML pages and include the Search engine panel, the About dialog box, error pages, favorite manager, etc...

Because you may want to customize the contents of these dialog boxes or translate them, you can edit their HTML code. However, please note that you should never modify the scripts or the forms inside these HTML pages. In fact, these pages are also managed by internal scripts that control how the publication work.

HTML Viewer and IE Browser publications do not share the same system HTML pages because their HTML engine are not the same.

To edit a system HTML page, select it in the list and click Edit (or double-click). The internal HTML editor will appear. Press OK to save your changes. This is your responsibility to check whether the pages will work fine once modified.

To import/export a system HTML page, select it in the list and press XML. Then select Import/Export and you will be prompted to enter the filename for the XML file. Pages are stored as CDATA items in the XML format so you can edit them with any XML editor (or even Notepad if you wish). When you import a page, the existing one is overwritten without any prompt.

System HTML pages use resource strings called "Strings for System HTML pages" for easier localization. All references to these strings are directly replaced when HTML Executable compiles the publication. To insert a reference to a string for a System HTML page, use this syntax: [#ID] where ID is the id of the string (IDs always begin with Y); example: [#YAbout] will be replaced by the value of "YAbout" which is "About".

By default, dialog boxes based on system HTML pages can be resized by end users. If you want to avoid this, please add the following meta tag to the HEAD section of the system HTML page's code:

<meta name="WindowNoResize" content="1">