[ve-dev] Is there someplace to store orphan constraints?

[Gerald Rosenberg <gerald@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Communicating with the remote VM; rewriting source ... 
the work you have done in implementing VE is really quite amazing.

Next issue: I need to find a good way to store "orphan constraints
values".  

That is, due to the nature of the Forms layout, it is helpful to allow a
design-time user to design a full set of constriaints (row, column &
span values) *before* components are actually added to the container:
design before build.   Of course, I will fully support
adding components with automatically generated next-available-location
constraints, but trying to rearrange everything after the fact can be
clumsy.

So, the scenario is that a design-time user may freely switch focus in VE
between all valid visual components, including multiple JPanels, each
with a FormLayout  and each having an associated List of
not-yet-used constraint objects.  I have no problem figuring out if
the currently selected JPanel has a FormLayout.  Just need to fetch
back the right List at component drop-time.

Does VE provide any mechanism that could be used for caching a set of
Lists orgainized by, say, EditPart?  Need not be permanently
persistent, but available for the duration of a VE editing session
against a particular java file.  

In any case, is EditPart the best object to use as the key selector for
these Lists?

Thanks,
Gerald



----
Gerald B. Rosenberg
Certiv Analytics

www.certiv.net