Android Question Great prog ... but a few questions

[Cristofayre]

Just finished the user manual: Fantastic! Whilst it got a bit heavy in places, been able to "suss" most of the points I need to build a simple app. But a couple of questions I don't think I read in manual.

In HTML, you can tile a static background. Is the same sort of thing possible in B4A such that a (say) 100px tile the entire screen behind an apps panels? If not, can the background be coloured. (One poss idea an autosize panel behind everything) Must be poss somehow 'cos games do it.

Second, my app may be used in noisy enviroments, so I'm wondering if there is a method to "play" a tone or similar. My idea is the person can wear an earpiece such that when they touch a panel, or a barcode is scanned succesfully, they hear a "bleep" / "bleep-bleep" in the earphone. Obviously, would be within the sub, but not sure if there is a code I could use (ie "play 'tone.mp3' ") I don't want to get too "heavy" code wise such as setting up a midi player!

Thirdly, I've read that you can invoke another program via it being initialised, and then make a call to it. OK for a one time run, but how do you call a (library) repeatedly? I don't think it's initialised each time. I'm thinking: touch panel, scan QR, run ZXing, store result ... touch panel, scan QR, run Zxing, store result ... and so on. OK, so perhaps the program can be started, and remain "active" whilst the app is running, but how do you send data to it each time / collect result. Is it an intent?

Fourth - is there a B.A.S.I.C number to hex call? (Know it's in VBScript, but not sure about B4A)

And finally ...

I can't let my user enter quotes or apostrophe. Am I correct in thinking REPLACE would change the string - or will I have to reiterate through it letter by letter? Does the former need any 'flag' to make it global rather than first instance, (ie in PERL, you have to put a "g" at the end)

NB: Like the timer idea. I WAS going to use a continuous DO While loop, but now appreciate that will "lock" the CPU and prevent it from doing anything else. I can now set a timer to check a folder for content every 10 seconds. Neat!

Yeah! Got far more confidence in this than Studio

 

[Cristofayre]

Solved one part. I've discovered if I click on the background in Abstract Designer, I can set a drawable colour, or load an image and "fill"

 

[Cableguy]

The shortest answer to all your questions is YES YOU CAN...
BUT... in order to use libs you need to register B4A, that's to say, buy it! A lib is treated like an object, like a text box etc... you can have several instances of the same lib as well as call methods within it several times.
You can play a sound file to signal your user. You can tile images using either a custom built module or a image de specific lib.
Base converti ons are also possible using the byte enumerated (there is also a lib that can do some of this but can't remember the name ).

 

[DonManfred]

there is also a lib that can do some of this but can't remember the name

Byteconverter

 

[Cristofayre]

Thanks for the reply CableGuy, and purchase looks like it will be an option. Byte enumerated? Will have to look that term up in the manual. Really, your first line is all I really need to know: Yes, you can, (albeit some routines are only in paid version. That's fair enough)

Spent an enjoyable 2hrs on it this morn, and - even for a first script - I've managed to create a display showing how many words people have typed into an EditText field ad display it in a label, and then put up a block after X words entered. I've also got a message box to pop up if they try to save an empty string ... but I've got to change something as it simply shows message rather than return to the program. That should be easy as I'm sure I saw that in guide.

I shall be spending many a happy hour working with B4A