just use a subpatcher. you can use "open" to [pcontrol] to pop it open, either by mouse click or some other means, and you can control the appearance (like floating/non-floating, title bar/no bar, etc.) with [thispatcher] inside the subpatch. Without a title bar, you'll need a way to close the window: again, "close" to [pcontrol], but it has to go out an outlet to the [pcontrol] that's outside...it closes itself from the inside, seems a little weird but works fine.

I use [pcontrol] so that I can hide the actual "p subpatch" object, and make the open button a nice-looking textbutton labeled "Help" or whatever's appropriate. You can center the text in [textbutton] which makes it look nicer than a message box IMO, and there's no text wrapping problems.

with a subpatch of course you can also have input if you want...really, you can have pretty much anything :)

but how to get that bottom menu (lock, new object, zoom, etc.) away?

@xidance:

send message window flags notitle, window exec to thispatcher for removing titlebar. you get rid of the bottom menu easily in the patcher inspector! just uncheck: show toolbar on open. you may want to check open in presentation too ? check the helpfile for [thispatcher]

cheers

it doesn´m matter if presentation mode, the bottom menu is there in both.

but it's ok. i just asked for a standalone which someone will use who's just using Max' runtime (which has no bottom menu).

no it shouldn`t be there if you save the patcher with "show toolbar on open" in the patcher inspector! i did it many times

have a look

ok thanks, i'll have it for future.

I'm also wondering if there is a dialog function as the OP described.

I'd like to create a very basic warning popup that describes the issue, then requires the user to click the box "okay" (or whatever the text would be) in order to be allowed to continue using the patch. Similar to when you, say, "save as" in Max and you're unable to interact with any windows until the "save as" window is closed.

I'm aware that you can create a patcher without any menus, status bars etc. to do a similar function, but this method still allows the user to operate the patch while this warning dialog window is open.

Any suggestions?

It's called a 'modal dialog'. Would be a nice thing to have.

I'd just like to be able to have a max window that wouldn't allow the toolbars to be unpinned. I have a small patch without menu or titlebar that I use for navigation. I want it as small as possible, but when mousing I'm constantly unpinning the toolbars on every side.

Is there any way to make these toolbars stay hidden?

+1 for a modal dialog! system dialogs can stop a process. For example, stopping the process to close your own application on closebang, something that can be useful if you want to tidy up things before someone closes the app. A max window can't do that.

would be a nice thing

Add me to the list of feature requesters... ;-)

+ 1 Just needed a 'modal dialogue' too

Came across this thread looking for such a feature; ended up making an external myself. Leaves a lot to be desired, but if you want it, it’s here: alert

Build is Mac only (soz). Any Windows experts willing to fork and do necessary VS++ configs, feel free. Seems to work fine on my machine, but for all I know it may be buggy. Also worth noting that that obtrusive popups are not recommended, and that the new version of the API appears to have actually dropped support for alerts by modal dialog. Nonetheless, figured it may be useful to someone.

Link fail, my bad. Get it here: github.com/jeevn/alert/releases