Events Overview

In addition to setting appearance and behavior properties of a screen item, you can associate code with the item to determine its functionality. Just as each screen element is associated with a certain set of properties, it is also associated with a certain set of events. An event is a user action to which the screen item is capable of responding. If a user enters information into an entry field, for example, the entry field is capable of recognizing each keystroke that the user types as a Notify-Changed event. Likewise, a push button control can recognize a mouse click as a Command-Clicked event. You can choose to capture these events and write code to respond appropriately to the user action.

In AcuBench, the Event tab of the Property window provides an interface that both lists the events to which a given control can respond and allows you to enter code to handle that event. For more information about adding event code in AcuBench, see Associating Code with Screen Elements. For a more general discussion of events and event handling, see ACUCOBOL-GT User Interface Programming.