Roku Developer Program

[eockh]

I have scoured the docs and I can't seem to find any indication if I can access the category selector seen in many of the stock Roku screens and create one in my custom roScreen. Is this possible at all?

Additionally, it appears that other than the video player, that there are no other UI widgets that can be used with a custom roScreen. Am I missing something fundamental here? I've started to roll my own concept of labels, buttons, tables, etc. but it seems like this is quite an investment in building my own UI toolkit when I would hope this would be part of the stock SDK. Am I just mistaken?

Thanks!

[MSGreg]

You are right. roScreen is a separate screen that in general cannot be used underneath other *Screen* objects and there are no "parts" that can be assembled and used on an roScreen. You would have to create usable parts separately. roScreen is designed mostly for custom UI where you want fine control of the UI and/or better performance of drawing (using direct drawing, double buffering, etc.) with the drawback of the developer needing to write a lot of supporting code.

I have used many of the selector screens in a stack for basic selection, then instantiated an roScreen on top for the "main" application/screen functionality, then deleted to roScreen when done to reveal the *Screen* stack again. Works well, but a little tricky. The use of roScreen relative to other objects is decribed in a forum post.

[eockh]

MSGreg, thanks for the response. I was afraid that I was correct. Seems very limiting and hard to bootstrap but I've gotten pretty far in a few days. Your thread link was very helpful as well since I needed to do something similar in my channel. Thanks.

[TheEndless]

Which "Category Selector" are you referring to? Can you give an example of a built-in screen that uses it? Without more information, it's hard to say whether it's available as part of the SDK or not.

[eockh]

The selector I'm referring to is the one in roPosterScreen (http://sdkdocs.roku.com/display/RokuSDK ... sterScreen) just under the overhang.

[RokuJoel]

yeah, you'll have to do all the work yourself if you want to create your own poster-screen equivalent with the 2D APIs.

The question is, are you certain there are no existing components that will give your the functionality you need without using roScreen?

- Joel

[TheEndless]

"eockh" wrote:
The selector I'm referring to is the one in roPosterScreen (http://sdkdocs.roku.com/display/RokuSDK ... sterScreen) just under the overhang.

That selector (more typically referred to as the filter banner) is populated by the SetListNames() (http://sdkdocs.roku.com/display/RokuSDK ... bjectnames) method of the roPosterScreen. SetFocusedList() (http://sdkdocs.roku.com/display/RokuSDK ... ritemIndex) allows you to set the focus programmatically. And the isListFocused() and isListSelected() roPosterScreenEvents (http://sdkdocs.roku.com/display/RokuSDK ... creenEvent) let you know when the user has interacted with them.

There are a number of examples of its usage in the code provided with the SDK, the most basic being the SimplePoster example.

[eockh]

@Joel - Unfortunately no...we're doing a very custom high end channel for a customer. They don't want stock anything.
@TheEndless - Thanks, I know how to use the filters in the poster screen. My hope was that it could be used as a standalone component in a roScreen.

[tvmision]

I need to learn how to put a banner ad on the page. I need instruction on how to write the line command to be able to see the banner ad on the page.Also I need how to write on the xml appl this command line. I am using the Screen type Category. Please help, I am new using your forum.

[RokuJoel]

"tvmision" wrote:
I need to learn how to put a banner ad on the page.

You really should start your own thread vs piggybacking on a thread not directly relevant to your question, and of course you need to specify exactly which type of screen you would use to display the banner ad. Before you do, search the forum to see if the answer might already be here.

- Joel