Help with accessing Variables and variable Context.

[stanger89]

After a bit of a hiatus, and now that the stock Sage library is better, I'm looking back and getting metadata into it. I think I know how I want to do it (that is cleanly integrated with the stock library), but I'm having some troubles early on.

First things first, starting "small" . I'm trying to add a button to the options column to access the metadata import menu. Sounds easy enough. I've renamed the panel, added the item and it shows up. Now the tricky part, I want to pass the contents of the currently displayed/filtered list off to the other library.

From looking at the code, it would appear, "TheVideoList" is the variable I want to send, but AddStaticContext ("MediaFiles", TheVideoList) doesn't send anything. I presume this is because TheVideoList is in a separate context from the Options pannel.

So the question is, how should I go about getting "TheVideoList" off to my menu?

[GKusnick]

There's a section on variable scoping rules on p. 49 of the (V6) Studio manual. But the short answer is that you need to create an attribute node at some place up the tree that's visible from both contexts. In your case it looks like BrowserPanelArea is the nearest common ancestor of VideoOptionsIconColumn and VideoBrowserPanel.

AddStaticContext is meant for passing variables from one menu to another. If this "other library" you're talking about is on a separate menu, then AddStaticContext is what you want. If it's just another subpanel of the same menu, then you don't need AddStaticContext; you just need to put the attribute high enough up the tree so that it's visible to everyone who needs it.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by GKusnick

There's a section on variable scoping rules on p. 49 of the (V6) Studio manual. But the short answer is that you need to create an attribute node at some place up the tree that's visible from both contexts. In your case it looks like BrowserPanelArea is the nearest common ancestor of VideoOptionsIconColumn and VideoBrowserPanel.

Yeah, kinda thought so, was hoping somebody had a better way

AddStaticContext is meant for passing variables from one menu to another. If this "other library" you're talking about is on a separate menu, then AddStaticContext is what you want.

Yup, it's another menu.

[Opus4]

Like Greg said, you could add TheVideoList as an attribute at a higher level. But, it contains valid data for only a couple of the views, so I hope you have your new button available only when those views are active, or else it won't contain anything useful compared to what the screen is listing.

- Andy

[GKusnick]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Yeah, kinda thought so, was hoping somebody had a better way

For programming language geeks, declaring variables explicitly in the scope where you want them is the better way. Implicit declarations of the sort allowed by Studio (where you can just assign to a variable name you haven't previously declared anywhere) are frowned on in computer science circles and are generally not permitted in modern programming languages.

[stanger89]

Let's put it this way, I was trying to minimize the amount of stuff I had to account for in the import. Looks like flacbar's tools will greatly aid in the task, but adding a bunch of stuff to existing menues is not trivial. And that was my goal, to take the existing library and add the stuff I wanted.

That would be pretty easy to do, just for myself, but it's bit more involved when you're trying to map it out for minimal effort to create an STVi from it.

[Opus4]

Just don't forget that those media browser menus aren't final & there could easily be changes that affect your import. If you do add the attribute at a higher level, watch that future versions of the STV don't add it somewhere too.

- Andy