how to create an icon button with separate visual up and down state?

[davecotter]

using Qt Widgets, C++ app

I'd expect i can create a QIcon with up and down states (selected? active?), then set that into a push button or tool button, but no, that doesn't work. when the user clicks in the button, no separate image is drawn.

how do i simply create a button that draws a different image while in its down state? is there sample code?

i've googled A LOT and found nothing simple. looking at the paintEvent() of QToolButton, it calls into drawComplexControl() and imagining re-implementing all that makes my head spin.

[davecotter]

okay wow it wasn't THAT hard. I override QToolButton with this:

void	QIconButton::paintEvent(QPaintEvent *e)
{
	QPainter	painter(this);
	QIcon		icon(_inherited::icon());
	QRect		frameR(QPoint(0, 0), iconSize());
	QIcon::Mode	mode = QIcon::Normal;

	if (isDown()) {
		mode = QIcon::Active;
	}

	icon.paint(&painter, frameR, Qt::AlignCenter, mode);
}

[Kent-Dorfman]

This is custom enough that I believe you would most likely need to subclass QAbstractButton and provide your own paint events...so "simply" is very relative in this case.

[jsulm]

@davecotter You could set different icons in https://doc.qt.io/qt-5/qabstractbutton.html#pressed (down/pressed state) and https://doc.qt.io/qt-5/qabstractbutton.html#released (up/released state).

[davecotter]

@jsulm how?

[Pl45m4]

@davecotter

By using stylesheet.

myButton->setStyleSheet("QPushButton#myButton:pressed { border-image: ..... }");
// Same for any other state

More examples here (https://doc.qt.io/qt-5/stylesheet-examples.html#customizing-qpushbutton)

[jsulm]

@davecotter said in how to create an icon button with separate visual up and down state?:

how?

What about https://doc.qt.io/qt-5/qabstractbutton.html#icon-prop ?
Or stylesheets as @Pl45m4 suggested

[davecotter]

okay wow it wasn't THAT hard. I override QToolButton with this:

void	QIconButton::paintEvent(QPaintEvent *e)
{
	QPainter	painter(this);
	QIcon		icon(_inherited::icon());
	QRect		frameR(QPoint(0, 0), iconSize());
	QIcon::Mode	mode = QIcon::Normal;

	if (isDown()) {
		mode = QIcon::Active;
	}

	icon.paint(&painter, frameR, Qt::AlignCenter, mode);
}