Dynamic rendering of Components in Container

[pralad-p]

I have a use-case which involves adding checkboxes (or just for an example, any Component) to a Container::Vertical dynamically. What do I mean?
Suppose I have a menu that has a menu option that calls fileSelectorCallback whenever Enter is hit on an Menu option.

    MenuOption file_menu_option;
    file_menu_option.on_enter = fileSelectorCallback;

fileSelectorCallback is called, which looks like this:

    auto fileSelectorCallback = [&]() {
                taskComponents.clear();
                taskComponents.push_back(checkbox);
    };

taskComponents here is the Children to the Container::Vertical I would like, to keep changing it's contents based on a menu option selected. It is defined as:

Components taskComponents;

I'm having issues with rendering the children of the container i.e. taskComponents since putting it in a Renderer would make me lose interactivity with it. For example, this is the solution I tried as well:

auto dynamicContentRenderer = ftxui::Renderer([&]() -> ftxui::Element {
        std::vector<ftxui::Element> elements;
        for (const auto& component : taskComponents) {
            elements.push_back(component->Render());
        }
        return ftxui::vbox(std::move(elements));
    });

which works, but I lose interactivity. Great library, btw!

[ArthurSonzogni]

Hello @pralad-p,

I wish there was a more "functional" way of doing it, but at least with the ftxui/component subpart of FTXUI, the best I have to offer is an "imperative" way of doing things: Define a Container::Vertical({}) and manually use ComponentBase::Add to add childrent to the tree.

If you have any API suggestion that would make your life easier, please don't hesitate to propose it.

[pralad-p]

Understood, that works for me. For now, it looks like a niche use-case but if I encounter it again, I'll make sure to drop a PR referencing this. Thanks again.