Creating Graphical User Interfaces

Setting the Tab Order - The Tab Order Editor

A GUI's tab order is the order in which components of the GUI are selected when a user presses the Tab key on the keyboard. When you create a GUI, GUIDE sets the tab order to be the order in which you add components in the Layout Editor. This is often not the best order for the user: if you add a component at the top of the GUI after adding one below it, pressing the Tab key selects the lower component before the upper one, contrary to the user's expectations. To change the tab order of GUI components, select Tab Order Editor in the Tools menu of the Layout Editor. For example, if you open the Tab Order Editor with the GUI described in Example: Creating a GUI, in the Layout Editor, the Tab Order Editor appears as in the following figure:

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The Tab Order Editor displays the components of the GUI in their current tab order. To change the tab order, select a component and press the up or down arrow to move the component up or down in the list. For example, if you want the pop-up menu, whose Tag is plot_popup, to be first in the tab order, select the pop-up menu and press the up arrow three times to move it to the top.

Defining Context Menus

Programming GUIs