Qt4 form MDI, what is it?

trungmap71

I a beginer. Help me everything about form MDI in Qt4(include how to create, call it, and use). thanks so much!

andre

First of all, question yourself if you really want or need MDI. By many, it is considdered a flawed UI paradigm, at least in the windows-within-a-window form. Considder if SDI isn't a better solution.

Having said that, take a look at [[doc:QMdiArea]] and [[doc:QMdiSubWindow]].

kunashir

Andre, why (where I may read this) MDI is a flawed UI paradigm. I thought it was a good idea for a multi-object interfaces (for example, many docs, many catalogs and other).

joonhwan

After reading this post, I searched google and found "this":http://discuss.joelonsoftware.com/default.asp?design.4.181903.38&ei=JxsFT6bsKs-biQfgqcmrBQ&usg=AFQjCNFVrXe6sTQp0I-FY7JKMBfcXFpacA&sig2=OGJhnQYM7mV8rTM5WqLUNw&cad=rjt discussion

in short, according to "this site ":http://www.ssw.com.au/ssw/Standards/Rules/RulesToBetterWindowsForms.aspx#AvoidMDI

Constrained within a smaller window
Only show as one window on the taskbar
Have no multiple monitor support (the killer reason)

That said, I think MDI has its own strong position though.

andre

No interleaving of documents with documents from other applications
Drag & Drop is hard to do between different documents within the application
No direct way to see which documents are open (unless you use a list like Qt Creator does)
For mac: doesn't fit mac paradigms

Blizzard

This is a helpful example on creating an MDI:
http://doc.qt.nokia.com/4.7-snapshot/mainwindows-mdi.html