Creating New Screens and Objects

Multiple Canvas screens and objects can be created, open and available for viewing, and in various stages of editing, at one time. Create a new screen or object in one of the following ways.

Via the Canvas Toolbar

Create a New Canvas Screen

• On the Canvas toolbar, click (Create a new screen) or Ctrl+N to open an empty new screen in your application window, using the default script language defined for the application.

Create a New Canvas Object

• On the Canvas toolbar, click the down arrow or Ctrl+Alt+N, then click New object or to open a new object file in your application window, using the default script language defined for the application.

Via the Backstage View

Create a New Canvas Screen

• Click File (or ) to access the Backstage view, then New, and then select a script language in which to open a new screen in your application window. See Screen for more information about configuring screens. Choose from the following options:
  • Create C# screen — Click (Create C# screen) to generate a new screen file and write script using C#. This is the default language selection when you create a new screen using the button in the Canvas application window.
  • Create VB screen — Click (Create VB screen) to generate a new screen file and write script using VB.NET.

Create a New Canvas Object

• Click File (or ) to access the Backstage view, then New, and then select a script language in which to open a new Canvas object in your application window. See Object for more information about configuring objects. Choose from the following options:
  • Create C# object — Click (Create C# object) to generate a new object file and write script using C#. This is the default language selection when you create a new object using the button in the Canvas application window.
  • Create VB object — Click (Create VB object) to generate a new object file and write script using VB.NET.

Using Canvas Panes

Use the Screen pane, both the Design and Script views, as you develop a screen to customize its functionality and content.

• Screen pane — Provides an environment for developing user interaction screens, including both design and scripting views:
  • Design view — Provides a grid environment to create screens, where you can graphically place and customize the appearance of each user element comprising the screen
  • Script view — Contains an environment to create or edit screen content in a chosen script language (C# or VB.NET), where you can write script, add and remove references, and introduce custom elements to design customized screens
  • Controls view — Contains a list of all Canvas controls on your screen or object grouped by Type and displaying a subset of shared properties. You can edit several of these properties on this view and the changes will be reflected in the Properties pane.

Use the available support panes for adding controls, configuring properties and events, and viewing your progress during screen creation. Each of the following panes can be customized to aid your screen generation process:

• Toolbox pane — Displays a toolbox of available controls and objects that can be placed on your screen
• Properties pane — Lists the associated property details that can be configured for the selected screen or object
• Events pane — Lists the associated events that can be called for the selected screen object
• Layers pane — Lists all configured layers for the screen or object that is currently selected in the screen pane
• Output pane — Shows any errors with your script results
• Log Viewer pane — Shows the contents of the Canvas log file

Using Canvas Log Files

Use the Canvas log files to help troubleshoot your screens. The log files are stored by default in the Users\<CurrentUser>\AppData\Local\CygNet\LogFiles\Canvas folder on the host server. See Viewing Log Files for more information.