Preferences

Overview

The Cuis Smalltalk development environment is customized via many preferences. These are stored in the global variable Preferences which is an instance of the class PreferenceSet.

Some preferences can be set from the “Preferences” submenu of the World menu. These include the following where the ones separated by a slash included opposite Boolean values for the same preference.

Focus follows Mouse (true; default) / Focus when Click (false)

These both set the Boolean preference #focusFollowsMouse.
Show ST-80 assignments (true; default) / Show ANSI assignments (false)

These both set the Boolean preference #showAssignmentAsLeftArrow.
Size of GUI elements…

This sets the SmallInteger preference #defaultFontSize which defaults to 21.
Set System Font…

This opens a menu that lists all the installed fonts where their names provide a samples of the fonts. Selecting one sets the Font preferences #standardButtonFont, #standardCodeFont, #standardListFont, #standardMenuFont, and #WindowTitleFont. The default font is “DejaVu Sans”. This preference is not saved in UserPrefs.txt.
Load all TrueType Fonts

This loads all TrueType font files found in the directory Cuis-Smalltalk-Dev/TrueTypeFonts so they can be selected from the “Set System Font…” menu item. Initially this directory contains the following font directories: AlexBrush, Amaranth, ComputerModern, Cream, DejaVu, JetBrainsMono, KiwiMaru, KurintoSans, LearningCurve, NotoEgyptianHieroglyphs, and SourceSans. Additional font directories can be placed here before selecting this menu item.
Icons…

This opens a submenu containing “Use icons for menu entries” (true; default) and “Don’t use icons for menu entries” (false). Both set the Boolean preference #wantsMenuIcons. This preference is not saved in UserPrefs.txt.
Themes…

This opens a submenu containing all the loaded themes. Selecting one changes the theme used by newly opened windows, but not the theme used by already open windows. This preference is not saved in UserPrefs.txt.

Initially the only themes available are “BrightColorTheme” (default) and “DarkTheme”. Select ”* Load Additional Themes *” to load more. These include:
- ClassicTheme
- DarkBlueTheme
- DarkColorTheme
- HighContrastBlackTheme
- HighContrastWhiteTheme
- LightBluetheme (The “t” in “theme” should be uppercase for consistency!)
- LightGrayTheme
- LightTheme
- PersonalizedTheme
Show taskbar / Hide taskbar

The taskbar is shown by default. Selecting these menu items does not change a preference value. They just modify the instance of WorldMorph to show or hide the taskbar which is persisted when the image is saved. This preference is not saved in UserPrefs.txt.
Full screen on / Full screen off

Full screen mode is off by default. Selecting these sends the message #fullScreenMode: to the DisplayScreen class which evaluates the primitive 233. This triggers the platform to change whether the Cuis window is rendered in full screen mode. This preference is not saved in UserPrefs.txt, but it is saved in the image.
Save Prefs in UserPrefs.txt (true; default) / Save Prefs in the Image (false)

These both set the Boolean preference #useUserPrefsFile. Saving preferences to the file Cuis-Smalltalk-Dev-UserFiles/UserPrefs.txt enables them to affect all images opened in the future, not just the current image. This preference is not saved in UserPrefs.txt.
Set Code Author…

This prompts for your initials and full name. The responses are saved in the class variables AuthorInitials and AuthorName, in the Utilities class, not in UserPrefs.txt. They can be retrieved by evaluating Utilities authorInitials and Utilities authorName.

If you have contributed to Cuis Smalltalk, your initials and name will appear in the SystemDictionary instance method knownInitialsAndNames. This makes it so after entering your initials, you can be asked to confirm your name rather than requiring it to be entered it again.
All preferences…

This evaluates Preferences allPreferences inspect which opens an Inspect window that displays all the current preferences.

Built-in Preferences

The base Cuis image populates this with the following preferences. This list was obtained by evaluating Preferences allPreferences keys asSortedCollection print.

#aaFontsColormapDepth
#allowBlockArgumentAssignment
#allowNonBooleanReceiversOfBooleanMessages
#allowNonLocalReturnsInExceptionHandlers
#alternativeBrowseIt
#askConfirmationOnQuit
#askToInstallComplexPackage
#atMinusDigitMeaning
#autoNumberUserChanges
#autoReplaceNamedCharacters
#automaticPlatformSettings
#backgroundEffect
#balloonHelpEnabled
#biggerCursors
#browseWithPrettyPrint
#browserWindowClass
#cacheDisplayContentWhenMovingMorphs
#cacheTrueTypeGlyphs
#caseSensitiveFinds
#changeSetVersionNumbers
#cheapWindowReframe
#checkForSlips
#checkLostChangesOnStartUp
#classAnnotations
#classFinder
#clearPackagePathsOnImageMove
#clickGrabsMorphs
#cmdDotEnabled
#cmdDotInterruptTakesStatistics
#ctrlArrowsScrollHorizontally
#debugHaloHandle
#debugLogTimestamp
#debugShowDamage
#decorateBrowserButtons
#defaultAuthorName
#defaultFontSize
#diffsInChangeList
#diffsWithPrettyPrint
#dismissAllOnOptionClose
#drawKeyboardFocusIndicator
#extraDebuggerButtons
#fileOutANSIassignment
#focusFollowsMouse
#focusIndicatorWidth
#fullPrintItInWorkspaces
#fullScreenLeavesDeskMargins
#haloEnclosesFullBounds
#haloHandleSize
#haloSpecifications
#halosMorphBoundsFillColor
#halosMorphBoundsFrameColor
#halosShowCoordinateSystem
#highlightBlockNesting
#initialFileListDirectories
#italicsInShout
#listClassesHierarchically
#logDebuggerStackToFile
#machine
#menuKeyboardControl
#messageCategoryAnnotations
#methodAnnotations
#optionalButtons
#pointer
#prettyPrintRectangularBlocks
#properDisplayAlphaForFonts
#roundedButtonRadius
#roundedWindowRadius
#saveReleaseOptionsInWorldMenu
#scrollbarThickness
#selectionsMayShrink
#selectiveHalos
#serverMode
#shiftClickShowsImplementors
#shoutInWorkspaces
#showAnnotations
#showAssignmentAsLeftArrow
#showLinesInHierarchyViews
#soundQuickStart
#soundStopWhenDone
#soundsEnabled
#standardButtonFont
#standardCodeFont
#standardListFont
#standardMenuFont
#stylingWithEmphasisInWorkspaces
#subPixelRenderColorFonts
#subPixelRenderFonts
#syntaxHighlightingAsYouType
#systemCategoryAnnotations
#systemWindowEmbedOK
#tapAndHoldEmulatesButton2
#thoroughSenders
#tileResizerInWindowMenu
#transcriptLogVerbose
#usePreDebugWindow
#useUserPrefsFile
#userChangesFileNameExtension
#wantsMenuIcons
#warnAboutNonLocalReturnsInExceptionHandlers
#warnAndOfferLastUserChanges
#warnIfNoChangesFile
#warnIfNoSourcesFile
#windowTitleFont
#worldMenu

Setting in an Inspector

Many supported preferences are not directly on the Preferences submenu of the World menu. To access those, click “All preferences…” which opens a Preferences window. Click a preference symbol in the left pane to display its current value in the right pane.

To change the value of a preference:

Select it in the left pane.
Press cmd-i (inspect) to open an Inspect window.
In the bottom pane, enter value := {new-value} and “Do it”.
Close the Inspect window.
Close the Preferences window.

The following code sets a preference to enable playing sounds and plays a basic sound:

Preferences at: #soundsEnabled put: true.
Smalltalk primitiveBeep.

PreferenceSet

Your packages can store user preferences in a PreferenceSet.

The first step is to ensure that a default value for the preference is set. To do this, add the class method initialize to one of your classes. For example:

initialize

    Preferences
        name: #backgroundEffect
        description: 'determines how backgroundImage is applied'
        category: #gui
        type: Symbol
        value: #stretch.

Preference names must be instances of Symbol rather than String.

The provided category symbols can be retrieved with Preferences categories. By default that returns #(#font #gui #programming #system).

To change a preference value:

Preferences name: #backgroundEffect category: #gui value: #tile.
"or this to omit specifying the category"
Preferences at: #backgroundEffect put: #tile.

To save a preference to the file Cuis-Smalltalk-Dev-UserFiles/UserPrefs.txt from which preferences will be restored each time an image is started:

Preferences saveToDisk: #backgroundEffect.

To retrieve a preference value:

effect := Preferences at: #backgroundEffect.

The Question Mark - blog by Mark Volkmann

Preferences

Overview

Setting from World Menu

Built-in Preferences

Setting in an Inspector

PreferenceSet