define-property

Macro

Package: common-graphics

Arguments: name &rest args&key reader writer accessor type dependent-properties initarg help-string remake editor-mode read-only choices hidden repositioning

Defines an individual property within a defproperties form. On the defproperties page, there is an example which contains examples of calls to define-property.

This macro defines a property but does not associate it with any class or object. A property is an attribute of an object that defines a high-level means of accessing the attribute value. Properties are largely used by the inspector for editing objects that have properties, though they are useful programmatically as well mostly because a property defines how to cause any appropriate side effects when the property value is modified. A property for a CLOS object is typically based on a slot of the object, but properties are generally independent of any internal representation and can be defined for any lisp type.

A property may define any of the following property facets, listed here with the initarg that is used to specify each:

Properties of CLOS classes inherit similarly to slots. Only those facets that differ from the inherited property need be specified for a given class, and properties that have no differing facets need not be specified at all.

Properties are shown on a separate tab of the inspector, and thus can serve as a relatively high-level interface to the object by providing a selected subset of the object's internal attributes, where each property knows to either disallow modification or to cause appropriate side effects upon modification in order to maintain a consistant environment.

Common Graphics and IDE documentation is described in About Common Graphics and IDE documentation in cgide.htm.

The documentation is described in introduction.htm and the index is in index.htm.

Copyright (c) 1998-2000, Franz Inc. Berkeley, CA., USA. All rights reserved.

Created 2000.10.5.