Wait for QML-Dialog in C++ Backend

[kain]

Re: Wait for dialog response

Hey there,

I am referring to that upper thread which did not have an usable answer for me. I need some kind of dialog-mechanism in my (backend-) code which is able to invoke some Dialog in QML and (the important part) receives the result from it.

So far I have a small test-application to invoke some dialog:

int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
    QGuiApplication app(argc, argv);
    QQuickView m_view;

    m_view.setSource(QUrl("qrc:///main.qml"));
    m_view.show();

    auto object = qobject_cast<QObject*> (m_view.rootObject());

    QVariant returnedValue;
    QVariant msg = "Hello from C++";
    QMetaObject::invokeMethod(object, "showMessageBox", Qt::ConnectionType::DirectConnection,  Q_RETURN_ARG(QVariant, returnedValue));
// I want to wait for the result
    qDebug() << returnedValue.toString();



    return app.exec();
}

QML:

Item {
    id: window
    visible: true
    width: 640
    height: 480

    function showMessageBox() {
        return dialog.open()
    }


    Dialog {
        id: dialog
        title: "Title"
        modal: true
        width: 200
        standardButtons: Dialog.Ok | Dialog.Cancel
    }
}

Is it somehow possible to wait for that QML-invocation? I know I could rewrite my code and split it into several signal-handlers but that would be a very unpractical way for me..

Thanks!

[dheerendra]

I suggest to use signal/slots mechanism to make it clean interface. Also is your code not working ?

[KroMignon]

@kain In my point of view, the easiest solution is to use a QObject and work with signals/slots.
I would first create a simple QObject class, like this:

class DialogInterface : public QOject
{
    Q_OBJECT

public:
    explicit DialogInterface (Object *parent  = 0): QObject(parent) {}

    // You can add as parameter what ever you want to become from QML
    Q_INVOKABLE void dialogClosed(int select) {}

signals:
    void requestDialog();
}

modifiy the main.cpp to add DialogInterface instance and shared it with QML:

int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
    QGuiApplication app(argc, argv);
    QQuickView m_view;

    m_view.setSource(QUrl("qrc:///main.qml"));
    m_view.show();

    // create intance and share it with QML context
    DialogInterface  dialogInterface;
    m_view.rootContext()->setContextProperty("dialogInterface", &dialogInterface);

    // request dialog to be show
   QTimer::singleShort(0, &dialogInterface, &DialogInterface::requestDialog);

    return app.exec();
}

And finaly the QML part:

Item {
    id: window
    visible: true
    width: 640
    height: 480

   Connections {
       target: dialogInterface
       onRequestDialog: {
            dialog.open()
        }
    }

    Dialog {
        id: dialog
        title: "Title"
        modal: true
        width: 200
        standardButtons: Dialog.Ok | Dialog.Cancel
        onOk: {
             console.log("OK pressed")
             dialogInterface.dialogClosed(0);
        }
        onDiscard: {
             console.log("Cancel pressed")
             dialogInterface.dialogClosed(-1);
        }
    }
}

[kain]

Thank you, but that does not solve my problem.
I want a blocking mechanism when I invoke the dialog.
In my code I have several places where I need to raise some dialog (notificaion, warning, yes/no, etc). It is just not very feasible to split this code up.

Imagine I got the following to (pseudo)code-snippets which run in parallel on different QThreads:

SnippetA:

doSomethingA1();
auto result = dialogService.showMessageBox("Do you want to save your progress?");
if (result == Dialog::accepted)
  save();
doSomethingA2();

SnippetB:

doSomethingB1();
auto result = dialogService.showMessageBox("Do you want to to delete everything, kill every process and shutdown?");
if (result == Dialog::accepted)
  destroyeverything();
else
  doSomethingB2();

This works fine if I have that blocking mechanism like above. But now If I change this to be asynchronous:

SnippetA:

classA::someMethod() {
  doSomethingA1();
  emit dialogService.showMessageBox("Do you want to save your progress?");
}

classA::slotHandlerOnAccept() {
  save();
  doSomethingA2();
}

classA::slotHandlerOnReject() {
    doSomethingA2();
}

SnippetB:

classB::someMethod() {
  doSomethingB1();
  emit dialogService.showMessageBox("Do you want to to delete everything, kill every process and shutdown?");
}

classB::slotHandlerOnAccept() {
  destroyeverything();
}

classB::slotHandlerOnReject() {
    doSomethingB2();
}

I hope it is clear to see that this code will cause some trouble if both classes want to show a dialog at the same time. How would I deal with that?

Or would it be more suitiable to create a dialogService which sits in its own thread and which blocks via an local eventloop until the result of the dialog is emitted?

[KroMignon]

@kain Yes, I think I have understand what you want to achieve. It ist not so easy.

I seen one possibility which is not too difficult.
You create a kind of template class to register the dialog message and store the result.
Something like this:

class DialogRequest : public QOject
{
    Q_OBJECT

    Q_PROPERTY(QString message READ message CONSTANT)

public:
    explicit DialogRequest(const QString& message, Object *parent  = 0): QObject(parent), m_message(message) {}
    QString message() const { return m_message; }

signals:
     void done(QObject* dialog, int result);

private:
    QString m_message;
}
class DialogInterface : public QOject
{
    Q_OBJECT

public:
    explicit DialogInterface (Object *parent  = 0): QObject(parent) {}

    DialogRequest * createMessage(const QString& message)
    {
        // add parent to avoid QML taking ownership of instance!!!
        return new DialogRequest(message, this);
    }

    void showDialog(DialogRequest * dlg) { emit requestDialog(dlg);   }

signals:
    void requestDialog(QObject* dialogObj);
}

Create new QML Component called, for example MyDialog:

Dialog {
    id: dialog
    property var dialogInfo
    title: !!dialogInfo ? dialogInfo.message : "Title"
    modal: true
    width: 200
    standardButtons: Dialog.Ok | Dialog.Cancel
    onOk: {
         console.log("OK pressed")
         dialogInfo .done(dialogInfo , 0);
    }
    onDiscard: {
         console.log("Cancel pressed")
         dialogInfo.done(dialogInfo , -1);
    }
}

change QML as follow:

Item {
    id: window
    visible: true
    width: 640
    height: 480

   Connections {
       target: dialogInterface
       onRequestDialog: {
            var newDialog = Qt.createQmlObject("MyDialog.qml", window, "dynamicMessage")
            newDialog.dialogInfo = dialogObj
            newDialog.open()
        }
    }
}

Then in C++ something like this

  auto* newDialog = dialogInterface.createMessage("This is a title");
  
   connect(newDialog, &DialogRequest::done, this, [&](QObject* dialog, int result){
        dialog->deleteLater();
        if(result == 0)
        {
              // do Ok stuff
        }
        else
        {
             // do error stuff
        }
});
   dialogInterface.requestDialog(newDialog);

This is just an example in which way it can be done, and must be fine tune/adapted.
Just to give you a starting impulse

Hope this will help you to solve your problem.