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KCompletion Class Reference

A generic class for completing QStrings. More...

#include <kcompletion.h>

Inheritance diagram for KCompletion:

List of all members.

Public Types
enum	CompOrder { Sorted, Insertion, Weighted }
Public Slots
void	slotMakeCompletion (const QString &string)
void	slotPreviousMatch ()
void	slotNextMatch ()
void	insertItems (const QStringList &items)
virtual void	setItems (const QStringList &list)
void	addItem (const QString &item)
void	addItem (const QString &item, uint weight)
void	removeItem (const QString &item)
virtual void	clear ()
Signals
void	match (const QString &item)
void	matches (const QStringList &matchlist)
void	multipleMatches ()
Public Methods
	KCompletion ()
virtual	~KCompletion ()
virtual QString	makeCompletion (const QString &string)
QStringList	substringCompletion (const QString &string) const
QString	previousMatch ()
QString	nextMatch ()
virtual const QString &	lastMatch () const
QStringList	items () const
virtual void	setCompletionMode (KGlobalSettings::Completion mode)
KGlobalSettings::Completion	completionMode () const
virtual void	setOrder (CompOrder order)
CompOrder	order () const
virtual void	setIgnoreCase (bool ignoreCase)
bool	ignoreCase () const
QStringList	allMatches ()
QStringList	allMatches (const QString &string)
KCompletionMatches	allWeightedMatches ()
KCompletionMatches	allWeightedMatches (const QString &string)
virtual void	setEnableSounds (bool enable)
bool	isSoundsEnabled () const
bool	hasMultipleMatches () const
void	enableSounds ()
void	disableSounds ()
Protected Methods
virtual void	postProcessMatch (QString *match) const
virtual void	postProcessMatches (QStringList *matches) const
virtual void	postProcessMatches (KCompletionMatches *matches) const

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Detailed Description

A generic class for completing QStrings.

This class offers easy use of "auto-completion", "manual-completion" or "shell completion" on QString objects. A common use is completing filenames or URLs (see KURLCompletion()). But it is not limited to URL-completion -- everything should be completable! The user should be able to complete email-addresses, telephone-numbers, commands, SQL queries, ... Every time your program knows what the user can type into an edit-field, you should offer completion. With KCompletion, this is very easy, and if you are using a line edit widget (KLineEdit), it is even more easy. Basically, you tell a KCompletion object what strings should be completable and whenever completion should be invoked, you call makeCompletion(). KLineEdit and (an editable) KComboBox even do this automatically for you.

KCompletion offers the completed string via the signal match() and all matching strings (when the result is ambiguous) via the method allMatches().

Notice: auto-completion, shell completion and manual completion work slightly differently:

• auto-completion always returns a complete item as match. When more than one matching items are available, it will deliver just the first (depending on sorting order) item. Iterating over all matches is possible via nextMatch() and previousMatch().

• popup-completion works in the same way, the only difference being that the completed items are not put into the edit-widget, but into a separate popup-box.

• manual completion works the same way as auto-completion, the subtle difference is, that it isn't invoked automatically while the user is typing, but only when the user presses a special key. The difference of manual and auto-completion is therefore only visible in UI classes, KCompletion needs to know whether to deliver partial matches (shell completion) or whole matches (auto/manual completion), therefore KGlobalSettings::CompletionMan and KGlobalSettings::CompletionAuto have the exact same effect in KCompletion.

• shell completion works like how shells complete filenames: when multiple matches are available, the longest possible string of all matches is returned (i.e. only a partial item). Iterating over all matching items (complete, not partial) is possible via nextMatch() and previousMatch().

You don't have to worry much about that though, KCompletion handles that for you, according to the setting setCompletionMode(). The default setting is globally configured by the user and read from KGlobalSettings::completionMode().

A short example:

 KCompletion completion;
 completion.setOrder( KCompletion::Sorted );
 completion.addItem( "pfeiffer@kde.org" );
 completion.addItem( "coolo@kde.org" );
 completion.addItem( "carpdjih@sp.zrz.tu-berlin.de" );
 completion.addItem( "carp@cs.tu-berlin.de" );

 cout << completion.makeCompletion( "ca" ).latin1() << endl;
 

In shell-completion-mode, this will be "carp"; in auto-completion- mode it will be "carp@cs.tu-berlin.de", as that is alphabetically smaller. If setOrder was set to Insertion, "carpdjih@sp.zrz.tu-berlin.de" would be completed in auto-completion-mode, as that was inserted before "carp@cs.tu-berlin.de".

You can dynamically update the completable items by removing and adding them whenever you want. For advanced usage, you could even use multiple KCompletion objects. E.g. imagine an editor like kwrite with multiple open files. You could store items of each file in a different KCompletion object, so that you know (and tell the user) where a completion comes from.

Note: KCompletion does not work with strings that contain 0x0 characters (unicode nul), as this is used internally as a delimiter.

You may inherit from KCompletion and override makeCompletion() in special cases (like reading directories/urls and then supplying the contents to KCompletion, as KURLCompletion does), but generally, this is not necessary.

Author:

Carsten Pfeiffer <pfeiffer@kde.org>

Version:

Id:

kcompletion.h,v 1.65.2.1 2003/02/09 13:55:28 rnolden Exp

Definition at line 130 of file kcompletion.h.

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Member Enumeration Documentation

enum KCompletion::CompOrder

Constants that represent the order in which KCompletion performs completion-lookups. Enumeration values: Sorted  Use order of insertion. Insertion  Use alphabetically sorted order. Weighted  Use weighted order. Definition at line 143 of file kcompletion.h. Referenced by order().

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Constructor & Destructor Documentation

KCompletion::KCompletion (    )

Constructor, nothing special here :)

virtual KCompletion::~KCompletion (    )  [virtual]

Destructor, nothing special here, either.

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Member Function Documentation

void KCompletion::addItem (  const QString &    item, uint    weight )  [slot]

Adds an item to the list of available completions. Resets the current item-state (previousMatch() and nextMatch() won't work anymore). Sets the weighting of the item to weight or adds it to the current weighting if the item is already available. The weight has to be greater than 1 to take effect (default weight is 1). Parameters: item  the item to add weight  the weight of the item, default is 1

void KCompletion::addItem (  const QString &    item )  [slot]

Adds an item to the list of available completions. Resets the current item-state (previousMatch() and nextMatch() won't work anymore). Parameters: item  the item to add

QStringList KCompletion::allMatches (  const QString &    string )

Returns a list of all items matching string. Parameters: string  the string to match Returns: the list of all matches

QStringList KCompletion::allMatches (    )

Returns a list of all items matching the last completed string. Might take some time, when you have LOTS of items. Returns: a list of all matches for the last completed string. See also: substringCompletion

KCompletionMatches KCompletion::allWeightedMatches (  const QString &    string )

Returns a list of all items matching string. Parameters: string  the string to match Returns: a list of all matches

KCompletionMatches KCompletion::allWeightedMatches (    )

Returns a list of all items matching the last completed string. Might take some time, when you have LOTS of items. The matches are returned as KCompletionMatches, which also keeps the weight of the matches, allowing you to modify some matches or merge them with matches from another call to allWeightedMatches(), and sort the matches after that in order to have the matches ordered correctly. Returns: a list of all completion matches See also: substringCompletion

virtual void KCompletion::clear (    )  [virtual, slot]

Removes all inserted items.

KGlobalSettings::Completion KCompletion::completionMode (    )  const [inline]

Return the current completion mode. May be different from KGlobalSettings::completionMode(), if you explicitly called setCompletionMode(). Returns: the current completion mode See also: setCompletionMode Definition at line 262 of file kcompletion.h. References KGlobalSettings::Completion.

void KCompletion::disableSounds (    )  [inline]

Deprecated: See also: setEnableSounds Definition at line 390 of file kcompletion.h.

void KCompletion::enableSounds (    )  [inline]

Deprecated: See also: setEnableSounds Definition at line 384 of file kcompletion.h.

bool KCompletion::hasMultipleMatches (    )  const [inline]

Returns true when more than one match is found. Returns: true if there are more than one match See also: multipleMatches Definition at line 377 of file kcompletion.h.

bool KCompletion::ignoreCase (    )  const [inline]

Return whether KCompletion acts case insensitively or not. Default is false (case sensitive). Returns: true if the case will be ignored See also: setIgnoreCase Definition at line 310 of file kcompletion.h.

void KCompletion::insertItems (  const QStringList &    items )  [slot]

Inserts items into the list of possible completions. Does the same as setItems(), but does not call clear() before. Parameters: items  the items to insert

bool KCompletion::isSoundsEnabled (    )  const [inline]

Tells you whether KCompletion will play sounds on certain occasions. Default is enabled. Returns: true if sounds are enabled See also: enableSounds , disableSounds Definition at line 370 of file kcompletion.h.

QStringList KCompletion::items (    )

Returns a list of all items inserted into KCompletion. This is useful if you need to save the state of a KCompletion object and restore it later. Important note: when order() == Weighted, then every item in the stringlist has its weight appended, delimited by a colon. E.g. an item "www.kde.org" might look like "www.kde.org:4", where 4 is the weight. This is necessary so that you can save the items along with its weighting on disk and load them back with setItems(), restoring its weight as well. If you really don't want the appended weightings, call setOrder( KCompletion::Insertion ) before calling items(). Returns: a list of all items See also: setItems

virtual const QString& KCompletion::lastMatch (    )  const [inline, virtual]

Returns the last match. Might be useful if you need to check whether a completion is different from the last one. Returns: the last match. QString::null is returned when there is no last match. Definition at line 222 of file kcompletion.h.

virtual QString KCompletion::makeCompletion (  const QString &    string )  [virtual]

Attempts to find an item in the list of available completions, that begins with string. Will either return the first matching item (if there is more than one match) or QString::null, if no match was found. In the latter case, a sound will be issued, depending on isSoundsEnabled(). If a match was found, it will also be emitted via the signal match(). If this is called twice or more often with the same string while no items were added or removed in the meantime, all available completions will be emitted via the signal matches(). This happens only in shell-completion-mode. Parameters: string  the string to complete Returns: the matching item, or QString::null if there is no matching item. See also: slotMakeCompletion , substringCompletion Reimplemented in KShellCompletion, and KURLCompletion. Referenced by slotMakeCompletion().

void KCompletion::match (  const QString &    item )  [signal]

The matching item. Will be emitted by makeCompletion(), previousMatch() or nextMatch(). May be QString::null if there is no matching item. Parameters: item  the match, or QString::null if there is none Referenced by postProcessMatch().

void KCompletion::matches (  const QStringList &    matchlist )  [signal]

All matching items. Will be emitted by makeCompletion() in shell- completion-mode, when the same string is passed to makeCompletion twice or more often. Parameters: matchlist  the list of matches Referenced by postProcessMatches().

void KCompletion::multipleMatches (    )  [signal]

This signal is emitted, when calling makeCompletion() and more than one matching item is found. See also: hasMultipleMatches

QString KCompletion::nextMatch (    )

Returns the next item from the matching-items-list. When reaching the last item, the list is rotated, so it will return the first match and a sound is issued (depending on isSoundsEnabled()). Returns: the next item from the matching-items-list. When there is no match, QString::null is returned and a sound is issued See also: slotNextMatch Referenced by slotNextMatch().

CompOrder KCompletion::order (    )  const [inline]

Returns the completion order. Returns: the current completion order. See also: setOrder Definition at line 293 of file kcompletion.h. References CompOrder.

virtual void KCompletion::postProcessMatch (  QString *    match )  const [inline, protected, virtual]

This method is called after a completion is found and before the matching string is emitted. You can override this method to modify the string that will be emitted. This is necessary e.g. in KURLCompletion(), where files with spaces in their names are shown escaped ("filename\ with\ spaces"), but stored unescaped inside KCompletion. Never delete that pointer! Default implementation does nothing. Parameters: match  the match to process See also: postProcessMatches Reimplemented in KShellCompletion, and KURLCompletion. Definition at line 519 of file kcompletion.h. References match().

virtual void KCompletion::postProcessMatches (  KCompletionMatches *    matches )  const [inline, protected, virtual]

This method is called before a list of all available completions is emitted via matches. You can override this method to modify the found items before match() or matches() are emitted. Never delete that pointer! Default implementation does nothing. Parameters: matches  the matches to process See also: postProcessMatch Reimplemented in KShellCompletion, and KURLCompletion. Definition at line 543 of file kcompletion.h. References matches().

virtual void KCompletion::postProcessMatches (  QStringList *    matches )  const [inline, protected, virtual]

This method is called before a list of all available completions is emitted via matches. You can override this method to modify the found items before match() or matches are emitted. Never delete that pointer! Default implementation does nothing. Parameters: matches  the matches to process See also: postProcessMatch Reimplemented in KShellCompletion, and KURLCompletion. Definition at line 531 of file kcompletion.h. References matches().

QString KCompletion::previousMatch (    )

Returns the next item from the matching-items-list. When reaching the beginning, the list is rotated so it will return the last match and a sound is issued (depending on isSoundsEnabled()). Returns: the next item from the matching-items-list. When there is no match, QString::null is returned and a sound is be issued. See also: slotPreviousMatch Referenced by slotPreviousMatch().

void KCompletion::removeItem (  const QString &    item )  [slot]

Removes an item from the list of available completions. Resets the current item-state (previousMatch() and nextMatch() won't work anymore). Parameters: item  the item to remove

virtual void KCompletion::setCompletionMode (  KGlobalSettings::Completion    mode )  [virtual]

Sets the completion mode to Auto/Manual, Shell or None. If you don't set the mode explicitly, the global default value KGlobalSettings::completionMode() is used. KGlobalSettings::CompletionNone disables completion. Parameters: mode  the completion mode See also: completionMode , KGlobalSettings::completionMode

virtual void KCompletion::setEnableSounds (  bool    enable )  [inline, virtual]

Enables/disables playing a sound when makeCompletion() can't find a match there is a partial completion (= multiple matches in Shell-completion mode) nextMatch() or previousMatch() hit the last possible match -> rotation For playing the sounds, KNotifyClient() is used. Parameters: enable  true to enable sounds See also: isSoundsEnabled Definition at line 361 of file kcompletion.h.

virtual void KCompletion::setIgnoreCase (  bool    ignoreCase )  [virtual]

Setting this to true makes KCompletion behave case insensitively. E.g. makeCompletion( "CA" ); might return "carp@cs.tu-berlin.de". Default is false (case sensitive). Parameters: ignoreCase  true to ignore the case See also: ignoreCase

virtual void KCompletion::setItems (  const QStringList &    list )  [virtual, slot]

Sets the list of items available for completion. Removes all previous items. Notice: when order() == Weighted, then the weighting is looked up for every item in the stringlist. Every item should have ":number" appended, where number is an unsigned integer, specifying the weighting. If you don't like this, call setOrder( KCompletion::Insertion ) before calling setItems(). Parameters: list  the list of items that are available for completion See also: items

virtual void KCompletion::setOrder (  CompOrder    order )  [virtual]

KCompletion offers three different ways in which it offers its items: in the order of insertion sorted alphabetically weighted Choosing weighted makes KCompletion perform an implicit weighting based on how often an item is inserted. Imagine a web browser with a location bar, where the user enters URLs. The more often a URL is entered, the higher priority it gets. Note: Setting the order to sorted only affects new inserted items, already existing items will stay in the current order. So you probably want to call setOrder( Sorted ) before inserting items, when you want everything sorted. Default is insertion order. Parameters: order  the new order See also: order

void KCompletion::slotMakeCompletion (  const QString &    string )  [inline, slot]

Attempts to complete "string" and emits the completion via match(). Same as makeCompletion() (just as a slot). Parameters: string  the string to complete See also: makeCompletion Definition at line 400 of file kcompletion.h. References makeCompletion().

void KCompletion::slotNextMatch (    )  [inline, slot]

Searches the next matching item and emits it via match(). Same as nextMatch() (just as a slot). See also: nextMatch Definition at line 418 of file kcompletion.h. References nextMatch().

void KCompletion::slotPreviousMatch (    )  [inline, slot]

Searches the previous matching item and emits it via match(). Same as previousMatch() (just as a slot). See also: previousMatch Definition at line 409 of file kcompletion.h. References previousMatch().

QStringList KCompletion::substringCompletion (  const QString &    string )  const

Returns a list of all completion items that contain the given string. Parameters: string  the string to complete Returns: a list of items which all contain text as a substring, i.e. not necessarily at the beginning. See also: makeCompletion

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The documentation for this class was generated from the following file:

• kcompletion.h

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