The DIALOG statement

The DIALOG instruction body can define INPUT, CONSTRUCT, DISPLAY ARRAY and INPUT ARRAY sub-dialogs blocks. All the form fields controlled by these sub-dialogs will be active at the same time:

DIALOG ...
   INPUT BY NAME ...
   END INPUT
   DISPLAY ARRAY ...
   END DISPLAY
   ...
END DIALOG

DIALOG ATTRIBUTES(UNBUFFERED)

Dialog control blocks such as BEFORE ROW, BEFORE FIELD are also available in the sub-dialogs of the DIALOG instruction. The purpose and excution sequence is similar to singular-dialogs. The big difference is with BEFORE INPUT, AFTER INPUT, BEFORE DISPLAY, AFTER DISPLAY, BEFORE CONSTRUCT and AFTER CONSTRUCT control blocks: In DIALOG sub-dialogs, these can be triggered multiple times during the dialog execution. The BEFORE dialog-type trigger is executed when the focus goes to a field of the sub-dialog, and the AFTER dialog-type trigger is executed when the focus goes to a field of another sub-dialog:

DIALOG ...
   INPUT BY NAME ...
      BEFORE INPUT
         MESSAGE "Now focus is in the INPUT sub-dialog"
      AFTER INPUT
         MESSAGE "Now focus leaves the INPUT sub-dialog"
   END INPUT
   ...
END DIALOG

Each sub-dialogs can define its ON ACTION handlers, for actions be used in the contact of the sub-dialog. Global dialog actions can be defined at the same level than sub-dialogs:

DIALOG ...
   INPUT BY NAME ...
      ON ACTION print
         ...
   END INPUT
   DISPLAY ARRAY ...
      ON ACTION check_row
         ...
   END DISPLAY
   ...
   ON ACTION print_all
      CALL print_customer_info()
   ...
END DIALOG

In a DIALOG block, the sub-dialogs must get a name to be identified. INPUT and CONSTRUCT need to be configured with the NAME attribute, while DISPLAY ARRAY and INPUT ARRAY sub-dialogs are implictly identified by the screen array name used to bind program arrays and screen fields. Sub-dialog names are for example used to identify sub-dialog specific actions:

DIALOG ...
   INPUT BY NAME rec_order.* ATTRIBUTES(WITHOUT DEFAULTS,NAME="orders")
   END INPUT
   DISPLAY ARRAY custarr TO sa_items.*
   END DISPLAY
END DIALOG

Unlike singular-dialogs, the DIALOG instruction does not create automatic accept/cancel actions. The typical ON ACTION handler to be defined a the DIALOG block level is for the close action, to let the user close the window:

DIALOG ...
   ...
   ON ACTION close
      EXIT DIALOG
END DIALOG