Introduction to PowerBuilder

Customizable Web links on PowerBuilder Menu

In version 6.0, you can display up to four web links on the PowerBuilder menu under the 'Help' menu bar item. When you install PowerBuilder, you see the following links.

To customize these links, you need to edit pb.ini file that is located in the PowerBuilder installation directory. The .INI file is a file that stores initialization values of an application such as defaults, last used values and preferences. A .INI file is divided into sections and each section name is surrounded by square brackets. A partial listing of section 'PB' looks like:

[PB]
CompilerWarnings=1
DashesInIdentifiers=1
DatabaseWarnings=1
Maximized=1

Each variable in the section is placed on the left and the value on the right seperated by an equal sign. Take the example of 'CompilerWarnings'. It is placed on the left and its value 1 on the right of the '=' sign. The keywords of web links are WebLink1, WebLink2, WebLink3, WebLink4 which can be found under 'PB' section.

To edit these web links, you need to supply the name you want to see on the menu and the actual web site address separated by a comma. For example, open pb.ini file and replace the code for those four variables with the code shown below and save the file.

WebLink1=&PowerSoft,http://www.powersoft.com
WebLink2=&Sybase,http://www.sybase.com
WebLink3=PowerBuilder &Online Courses,http://www.applied-software.com
WebLink4=&Yahoo,http://www.yahoo.com

In the above code, you find '&' (ampersand) characters. An ampersand creates an accelerator key for the menu item. An accelerator key is a letter that you press in   combination with an 'Alt' key to access the menu item quickly without using a mouse. For example, you can press 'Alt + F' and 'O' keys to access 'File/Open' from the menu.

If you restart PowerBuilder, the changed options under the 'Help' menu bar item will be as shown in the picture.

Home	Previous Lesson: Custom Toolbars Next Lesson: Script Editor