Function Completion: cycle through choices

[PeterJones]

I was going to put in a feature request regarding Function Completion autocomplete, but I wanted to make sure it wasn’t just a lack of knowledge on my part (there are many features of Notepad++ that I don’t know about or don’t remember).

Function Completion allowed multiple “overload” variants. I know when it pops down, you can click on the up and down arrows to cycle through those variants:

But is there a keyboard shortcut for that?

In Visual Studio, when there are overloaded functions, I can just hit the up and down arrow keys to cycle through the choices. But in Notepad++, I tried the arrows (plain, and modified with various combos of Alt/Ctrl/Shift) and TAB and PgUp/PgDn, but nothing I tried worked.

I did already check to make sure I hadn’t previously documented that but forgotten about it. And I tried searching the forum, but couldn’t find anything, even thought I thought it had been asked-and-answered before; sometimes my search-fu is weak.

It just seems odd that the word/function-name completion allows arrowing to select, but the function-parameter completion does not.

Does someone know if I’m just missing an obvious (or not-so-obvious) keystroke? Or is this really a feature that requires a mouse to cycle through the options?

If I get confirmation that it’s the latter, I will put in a feature request.

question triggered by a perlmonks post talking about IDE-like features in editors like Notepad++

[Ekopalypse]

@PeterJones

If I’ve done my homework, then completion is invoked by showNextOverload, which in turn is invoked by callTipClick, which in turn is assigned by SCN_CALLTIPCLICK or short, I assume you’re right, no shortcut.

[guy038]

Hello, @peterjones, @ekopalypse and All,

Unlike Eko, I basically tried a lot of possible shortcuts, including the Alt and AltGr keys. Unfortunately , I could not find any :-(( So, your assumption about the lack of shortcut, for that feature, seems correct !

BTW, as you did not mention the language used, I immediately supposed that it could be the Perl language. Bingo, I was right about it :-))

Best Regards,

guy038

[PeterJones]

@Ekopalypse & @guy038 ,

Thanks for the confirmation. I thought as much, but wanted to make sure.

Issue #11950 created

[Michael Vincent]

@Ekopalypse said in Function Completion: cycle through choices:

SCN_CALLTIPCLICK

It’s possible I’m completely incorrect, but it seems the SCN_CALLTIPCLICK is generated by the clicking of the arrow keys in the call tip. I think we want a keyboard key or key combo to generate that notification, so a bit backwards.

Would this involve trapping keyboard input (like say the up / down arrow keys and then checking SCI_CALLTIPACTIVE and if TRUE, then post a SCN_CALLTIPCLICK notification?

I’m trying to think about how to proof-of-concept this in PythonScript and not grokking where to start from the Scintilla docs - again it seems backwards - the clicking generates the notification and we want a keyboard key to generate the notification - not sure Scintilla supports that?

I do think this is a smashing idea though!

Cheers.

[Ekopalypse]

@Michael-Vincent

No, you are right.
I put the cart before the horse in my description.

It should be enough to use a Python script that sends the notification.
Give me a moment.

[Ekopalypse]

@Michael-Vincent

from Npp import notepad, editor, editor1, SCINTILLANOTIFICATION
import ctypes
from ctypes import wintypes

# def on_calltip_click(args):
    # if args['position'] == 1:
        # print('backward')
    # elif args['position'] == 2:
        # print('forward')
        

        
# editor.callbackSync(on_calltip_click, [SCINTILLANOTIFICATION.CALLTIPCLICK])


class NMHDR(ctypes.Structure):
    _fields_ = [('hwndFrom', wintypes.HWND),
                ('idFrom',   ctypes.c_size_t),
                ('code',     wintypes.UINT)]
    def __init__(self, hwnd, id, code):
        self.hwndFrom = hwnd
        self.idFrom = id
        self.code = code


Sci_Position = ctypes.c_size_t
class SCNOTIFICATION(ctypes.Structure):
    _fields_ = [('nmhdr', NMHDR),
                ('position', Sci_Position),
                ('ch', wintypes.INT),
                ('modifiers', wintypes.INT),
                ('modificationType', wintypes.INT),
                ('text', wintypes.LPCSTR),
                ('length', Sci_Position),
                ('linesAdded', Sci_Position),
                ('message', wintypes.INT),
                ('wParam', wintypes.WPARAM),
                ('lParam', wintypes.LPARAM),
                ('line', Sci_Position),
                ('foldLevelNow', wintypes.INT),
                ('foldLevelPrev', wintypes.INT),
                ('margin', wintypes.INT),
                ('listType', wintypes.INT),
                ('x', wintypes.INT),
                ('y', wintypes.INT),
                ('token', wintypes.INT),
                ('annotationLinesAdded', Sci_Position),
                ('updated', wintypes.INT),
                ('listCompletionMethod', wintypes.INT)]

SendMessage = ctypes.windll.user32.SendMessageW
SendMessage.argtype = [wintypes.HWND, wintypes.UINT, wintypes.WPARAM, wintypes.LPARAM]
SendMessage.restype = wintypes.LPARAM


nmhdr = NMHDR(editor1.hwnd, 0, SCINTILLANOTIFICATION.CALLTIPCLICK)
notification = SCNOTIFICATION()
notification.nmhdr = nmhdr
notification.position = 2

WM_NOTIFY = 0x4e
SendMessage(notepad.hwnd, WM_NOTIFY, 0, ctypes.addressof(notification))

I have not checked if the fields in the supplied nmhdr structure are really set correctly.

[Michael Vincent]

@Ekopalypse said in Function Completion: cycle through choices:

SendMessage(notepad.hwnd, WM_NOTIFY, 0, ctypes.addressof(notification))

Trying this out, I get an error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\usr\bin\npp64\plugins\Config\PythonScript\scripts\callTipClick.py", line 67, in <module>
    SendMessage(notepad.hwnd, WM_NOTIFY, 0, ctypes.addressof(notification))
ctypes.ArgumentError: argument 4: <class 'OverflowError'>: int too long to convert

Cheers.

[Michael Vincent]

@Michael-Vincent
@Ekopalypse

Fixed (probably should have noted I’m on 64-bit):

SendMessage(notepad.hwnd, WM_NOTIFY, 0, ctypes.c_longlong(ctypes.addressof(notification)))

Cheers.

[Michael Vincent]

@Michael-Vincent said in Function Completion: cycle through choices:

@Michael-Vincent
@Ekopalypse
Fixed (probably should have noted I’m on 64-bit):
@PeterJones

Works nicely now:

callTipClick.py:

from Npp import notepad, editor, editor1, editor2, SCINTILLANOTIFICATION
import ctypes
from ctypes import wintypes

class NMHDR(ctypes.Structure):
    _fields_ = [('hwndFrom', wintypes.HWND),
                ('idFrom',   ctypes.c_size_t),
                ('code',     wintypes.UINT)]
    def __init__(self, hwnd, id, code):
        self.hwndFrom = hwnd
        self.idFrom = id
        self.code = code

Sci_Position = ctypes.c_size_t
class SCNOTIFICATION(ctypes.Structure):
    _fields_ = [('nmhdr', NMHDR),
                ('position', Sci_Position),
                ('ch', wintypes.INT),
                ('modifiers', wintypes.INT),
                ('modificationType', wintypes.INT),
                ('text', wintypes.LPCSTR),
                ('length', Sci_Position),
                ('linesAdded', Sci_Position),
                ('message', wintypes.INT),
                ('wParam', wintypes.WPARAM),
                ('lParam', wintypes.LPARAM),
                ('line', Sci_Position),
                ('foldLevelNow', wintypes.INT),
                ('foldLevelPrev', wintypes.INT),
                ('margin', wintypes.INT),
                ('listType', wintypes.INT),
                ('x', wintypes.INT),
                ('y', wintypes.INT),
                ('token', wintypes.INT),
                ('annotationLinesAdded', Sci_Position),
                ('updated', wintypes.INT),
                ('listCompletionMethod', wintypes.INT)]

if editor.callTipActive():
    SendMessage = ctypes.windll.user32.SendMessageW
    SendMessage.argtype = [wintypes.HWND, wintypes.UINT, wintypes.WPARAM, wintypes.LPARAM]
    SendMessage.restype = wintypes.LPARAM

    hwnd = notepad.getCurrentView()
    if hwnd == 0:
        hwnd = editor1.hwnd
    else:
        hwnd = editor2.hwnd

    nmhdr = NMHDR(hwnd, 0, SCINTILLANOTIFICATION.CALLTIPCLICK)
    notification = SCNOTIFICATION()
    notification.nmhdr = nmhdr
    notification.position = 2

    WM_NOTIFY = 0x4e
    SendMessage(notepad.hwnd, WM_NOTIFY, 0, ctypes.c_longlong(ctypes.addressof(notification)))

NOTE: This relies in your PythonScript startup having some logic to get the editor1 and 2 HWND and create those variables I use in the script.

Then I just added this to my PythonScript menu and added a shortcut to it. Works like a charm:

Cheers.

[Ekopalypse]

@Michael-Vincent

I am also working with x64 bit.
The problem could be that you already have a SendMessage function declaration somewhere in your used Python script codes, which is defined slightly different.

>>> from ctypes import wintypes

>>> wintypes.LPARAM
<class 'ctypes.c_longlong'>

wintypes.LPARAM is already a c_longlong, so this cast would not be necessary, since the whole point of

SendMessage.argtype = [wintypes.HWND, wintypes.UINT, wintypes.WPARAM, wintypes.LPARAM]
SendMessage.restype = wintypes.LPARAM

is to give Python the information how to interpret certain variables.

[Michael Vincent]

@Ekopalypse said in Function Completion: cycle through choices:

The problem could be that you already have a SendMessage function declaration somewhere in your used Python script codes, which is defined slightly different.

Indeed, you are correct, and I’ve fixed it so your original code:

    SendMessage(notepad.hwnd, WM_NOTIFY, 0, ctypes.addressof(notification))

WORKS!

Cheers.

[Michael Vincent]

@Michael-Vincent said in Function Completion: cycle through choices:

SendMessage.argtype = [wintypes.HWND, wintypes.UINT, wintypes.WPARAM, wintypes.LPARAM]

Note this line should be:

SendMessage.argtypes = [wintypes.HWND, wintypes.UINT, wintypes.WPARAM, wintypes.LPARAM]

Note: argtypes

Cheers.

[Michael Vincent]

@PeterJones said in Function Completion: cycle through choices:

@Ekopalypse & @guy038 ,
Thanks for the confirmation. I thought as much, but wanted to make sure.
Issue #11950 created

PR #12017 created.

Cheers.

[Michael Vincent]

@Michael-Vincent said in Function Completion: cycle through choices:

PR #12017 created.
Cheers.

@PeterJones
@Ekopalypse
@guy038

DONE! - via commit 8519003

Cheers.

[Ekopalypse]

@Michael-Vincent - cool, a nice one, thx.