Dialog box

A dialog, dialog, dialog box or dialog box is a graphical user interface element.

Use

Dialogs are displayed to gather input from the user, for example:

  • During software installation, the user is asked if the installation should proceed in accordance with the standard defaults or if the user wants to specify the modules to be installed and target directories.
  • During a print job, the user can specify which printer to use, how many copies they wish to receive and whether certain pages are to be printed.

Properties dialog boxes

Usually dialogs are form -like. These controls such as text boxes and check boxes are used. Usually at the bottom they have buttons such as OK or Cancel, which allow the user to confirm his input or discard and can close the dialog. Simple dialog box, so-called messages contain only one question or note text and one or more buttons, such as Yes or No to answer a question.

If a dialog box several such input elements such as text boxes or buttons is active only getting one of them at any given time. By clicking with the mouse you can select another field. (Such as Windows ) For user interfaces that can be operated without a mouse, that is, using only the keyboard: If you press the Tab key on the keyboard after a preprogrammed sequence to the next input element is activated within the window. Together with the Shift key ( Shift ) you can go through this sequence backwards. If you press against it Return ( Return) or Enter ( Enter), the currently active button is pressed or recognized as a text entry as completed and closed the dialog box.

Modal and modeless dialogs

Modal dialogs block the rest of the application, as long as the dialog is displayed.

Modeless dialogs also allow entries outside of dialogue.

Standard dialogs

Dialogs are either now mostly generated by the programmer with graphical editors, as they are for example integrated in Microsoft Visual Studio, Apple Xcode or Netbeans. In general, standard dialogs are available from the respective GUI toolkit that can be used by a simple function call; this has the advantage that he trusted dialog box finds in different applications, for example for the user:

  • Messages with text and various combinations of buttons
  • File selection dialogs, with which the user can select one or more files or directory
GUI widget Widget toolkit
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