ForeColor Property

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Defined By: Window

Description:

Determines the foreground color of an object to be the system default color or a different color using the color palette, the RGB function, or QBColor function in code.

Settings:

Phoenix uses the MS Windows environment RGB scheme for colors. The optional =color argument can be specified using one of the following:

the RGB functions in code

the QBColor functions in code

a long integer constant (hexadecimal recommended)

Details:

The default foreground color for forms and controls is the selected using the Control Panel supplied with the Window's environment. A value of -1 for ForeColor indicates the form or control will display the system default color. You can override this default by setting the ForeColor property to a value other than -1.

You can begin each ForeColor expression by naming the specific form or control whose foreground you want to change. If you omit the form or control name, the system will change the foreground color of the current form or control.

The easiest way to understand how a long constant is converted to color is to consider the hexadecimal format of the constant, e.g. &HFFFFFF. Only the least-significant three bytes are important, with each byte specifying the intensity of one of the red, green, or blue components of the color. The least significant byte is the red component, the next byte (second from the right) is the green component, and the next (third from the right) is the blue component. This is the same as saying &H0000FF is bright red, &H00FF00 is bright green, and &HFF0000 is bright blue. The most significant byte should generally be zero, except when specifying -1 (&HFFFFFFFF) to indicate the form or control should use the default color.

To get a hexadecimal value for any of the 16 colors standard in Windows, you can use the QBColor function. The QBColor function requires you to specify the integer color number used in versions of Microsoft BASIC.

The RGB function, like QBColor, returns a hexadecimal value for colors. The color specified by an RGB function, however, is the result of combining a specified intensity of red, green, and blue. The value for the red, green, and blue arguments ranges from 0 to 255 (&HFF). The RGB function combines the given values of the components as described above to return a long integer value that represents the color.

Be sure to set the foreground color to solid when displaying text. If the foreground colors you specified are not displayed as expected, one of the selected colors may be dithered (comprised of up to three different-colored pixels). If you select a dithered color for the foreground, Phoenix automatically substitutes the nearest solid color.

Select your colors carefully. Always consider both the foreground and background color when changing and selecting colors.

The ForeColor property is useful for setting a color that calls attention to a designated form or control. For example, red or orange text is highly visible on a gray background and would quickly alert a user to information that was vital to their interaction with the program. Selecting certain color combinations or overusing colors such as red or orange can actually make your interface more difficult to see and use.

Data Type: Long

See Also:

FillColor property, FillStyle property