Forms 4.0: How Do You Cus

TM>I wasn't all that pleased with the iconic files that are available
TM>with  Forms 4.0. I wanted a button for a drop down list box, but the
TM>only LOV  button iconic that was available was one with five or six
TM>horizontal  lines going through it. Developers are recognizing that
TM>as the symbol for  a LOV, but Windows users don't.

TM>I wanted a button with an arrow and a horizontal line, just like in
TM>most  Windows applications. I found two simple iconic files, compared
TM>them at  the byte level, determined how the image is stored in the
TM>ICO file, and  then managed to design my own drop down list button.
TM>It looks almost as  good as a real Windows button image.

There are many popular icon editing programs available for Windows. They are hard to avoid, actually, being included with Norton's Desktop for Windows, most tool packages, and any Windows programmer's API package. Shareware icon editors are available for as little as $5.

TM>Have you ever designed your own button image icon files? How did you
TM>do  it? Is Oracle Graphics something I should investigate for this
TM>purpose? 

We use the "drop list" style button in most of our production applications to call lists of values. Although it is generally bad practice to go icon happy, there are around 15,000 icons readily available for Windows if you care not to draw your own (or twiddle bits, as the case may be.)

I should note that the original design of Microsoft Window's drop-list icon, the arrow pointing down with a line under it, was meant to signify that the drop-list could be called by pressing alt-downarrow.

Oracle Graphics is not an icon editor. It is probably worth some investigation, however.

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