A Property is an attribute of a control, class, or other object that you set to define one of the object's characteristics or an aspect of its behavior. For example, the Visible property affects whether a control can be seen at run time. You can change an object's property settings with the Properties window.
Design time is the mode of operation when an application is being created or designed. At design time, you create the components of your application and set their properties (using the properties window) or write code to control the application's behavior.
Run time indicates the time during which an application is running. During run time, you can interact with an application using a mouse or keyboard, or programmatically using code programming statements (for example, written in events or procedures).
Some properties are read-only and some can be written as well as read at run time. "Returns" means the value of the property can be read only at run time, for example, the hWnd and Image properties. "Returns or sets" means the value of the property can be read or written at run time, for example, the Text property.
Some properties can be read or set at design time and some only at run time. The Caption property is an example of a property that can be set at design time by the Properties Window, or at run time by executing programming code. If a property is not available at design time, the Properties Window will not be displayable. The hWnd property is an example of a property which can only be read at run time.
The following table describes the relationships between read/write at run time:
|
Control, class, or object with: |
Description |
Example |
|
"Returns" in the description |
Is read-only |
sbtn1Caption = btn1.Caption |
|
"Returns or sets" in the description |
Is read and write |
For Returns: sbtn1Caption = btn1.Caption For Sets: btn1.Caption = "Hello" |
Control properties are run-time properties that are managed by the control itself. For example, the font size and text size.
"Standard" properties are properties which behave similarly for many controls, for example, the Caption property.
"Extended" properties are properties that are associated with a control but are managed and created by ATEasy. For example, a control's position (Left and Top), size (Height and Width), and WhatsThisHelpText properties.