Copy/Paste from ListBox at runtime

Hello,

Is there a way to interactively select the entries in an AppDesigner ListBox and then copy them to a different application? Right-clicking on the elements in the list does not pop-up any context menu and also CTRL-C and CTRL-V do not seem to work...

Regards,

Cristian

Answer 1

[Adam Danz]

Add a right-click "copy" option to ListBox

Create a context menu for the list box and set its MenuSelectedFcn to use clipboard.

For single-selection list boxes

fig = uifigure;
lb = uilistbox(fig,"Items",["Rhodope","Rila","Pirin"]);
lb.ContextMenu = uicontextmenu(fig); 
m1 = uimenu(lb.ContextMenu ,'Text','Copy','MenuSelectedFcn',@(~,menuData)clipboard('copy',string(menuData.ContextObject.Value)));

For multiselect list boxes

m1 = uimenu(lb.ContextMenu ,'Text','Copy','MenuSelectedFcn',@(~,menuData)clipboard('copy',strjoin(menuData.ContextObject.Value,newline)));

[Adam Danz]

> I hoped it would be just some option I could tick in the configuration options of the ListBox.

There is no such option but if you are applying this to many list boxes, you can wrap it into a function that you can easily apply to list boxes.

fig = uifigure;
lb = uilistbox(fig,"Items",["Rhodope","Rila","Pirin"]);

% Add copy option
applyCopyOption(lb)



% Add this function to your app
function applyCopyOption(listboxHandle)
    fig = ancestor(listboxHandle,'figure'); 
    listboxHandle.ContextMenu = uicontextmenu(fig); 
    uimenu(listboxHandle.ContextMenu ,'Text','Copy','MenuSelectedFcn',@(~,menuData)clipboard('copy',string(menuData.ContextObject.Value)));
    % For multiselect listboxes: 
    % uimenu(lb.ContextMenu ,'Text','Copy','MenuSelectedFcn',@(~,menuData)clipboard('copy',strjoin(menuData.ContextObject.Value,newline)));
end

Answer 2

[Voss]

You can use the clipboard function.

You'd have to implement any context menu or ctrl+c behavior.

An example using a context menu:

f = uifigure();
lb = uilistbox(f,'MultiSelect','on');
cm = uicontextmenu(f);
uimenu(cm,'Text','Copy','MenuSelectedFcn',@(~,~)clipboard('copy',mat2str(string(lb.Value))));
lb.ContextMenu = cm;

To have ctrl+c do the copying, you can set the uifigure's KeyPressFcn or WindowKeyPressFcn. See more: uifigure properties

Answer 3

[Cristian Berceanu]

Thank you for clarifying! I hoped it would be just some option I could tick in the configuration options of the ListBox. Seems it's not.

Regards, Cristian