Saving The Application State#

The aim of this lesson is to illustrate how to define new settings starting from their schema, and bind them to properties on your window in order to save and restore the size and state of the window across different sessions.

Add new keys to the settings schema#

Settings are stored in a database, and each key is described inside a schema; the schema contains the type of the value associated with the key, as well as the default value of the key.

Open the com.example.TextViewer.gschema.xml file under the data directory
Add a window-width, window-height, and window-maximized keys to the schema, including their default values of 600, 400, and false, respectively

<schemalist gettext-domain="text-viewer">
  <schema id="com.example.TextViewer" path="/com/example/TextViewer/">
    <key name="window-width" type="i">
      <default>600</default>
    </key>
    <key name="window-height" type="i">
      <default>400</default>
    </key>
    <key name="window-maximized" type="b">
      <default>false</default>
    </key>
  </schema>
</schemalist>

Note

The schema will be installed automatically in the expected directory when building the application. This means that the application can only be run once it’s installed.

Use GSettings#

GSettings is the object that watches the keys for a specific schema id. You use the GSettings API to access the value of the keys, as well as get notified of changes in the settings.

Open the text_viewer-window.c file
Modify the TextViewerWindow instance structure to include a GSettings instance

struct _TextViewerWindow
{
  AdwApplicationWindow  parent_instance;

  GSettings *settings;

  /* Template widgets */
  AdwHeaderBar *header_bar;
  GtkTextView *main_text_view;
  GtkButton *open_button;
  GtkLabel *cursor_pos;
};

Modify the instance initialization function for TextViewerWindow text_viewer_window_init to create the GSettings instance for the com.example.TextViewer schema id

static void
text_viewer_window_init (TextViewerWindow *self)
{
  gtk_widget_init_template (GTK_WIDGET (self));

  g_autoptr (GSimpleAction) open_action = g_simple_action_new ("open", NULL);
  g_signal_connect (open_action, "activate", G_CALLBACK (text_viewer_window__open_file_dialog), self);
  g_action_map_add_action (G_ACTION_MAP (self), G_ACTION (open_action));

  g_autoptr (GSimpleAction) save_action = g_simple_action_new ("save-as", NULL);
  g_signal_connect (save_action, "activate", G_CALLBACK (text_viewer_window__save_file_dialog), self);
  g_action_map_add_action (G_ACTION_MAP (self), G_ACTION (save_action));

  GtkTextBuffer *buffer = gtk_text_view_get_buffer (self->main_text_view);
  g_signal_connect (buffer,
                    "notify::cursor-position",
                    G_CALLBACK (text_viewer_window__update_cursor_position),
                    self);

  self->settings = g_settings_new ("com.example.TextViewer");
}

Modify the class intialization function for TextViewerWindow text_viewer_window_class_init to include a finalization function; the text_viewer_window_finalize function will be called when the TextViewerWindow instance is going to be freed

static void
text_viewer_window_class_init (TextViewerWindowClass *klass)
{
  GtkWidgetClass *widget_class = GTK_WIDGET_CLASS (klass);
  GObjectClass *gobject_class = G_OBJECT_CLASS (klass);

  gobject_class->finalize = text_viewer_window_finalize;

  gtk_widget_class_set_template_from_resource (widget_class, "/com/example/TextViewer/text_viewer-window.ui");
  gtk_widget_class_bind_template_child (widget_class, TextViewerWindow, header_bar);
  gtk_widget_class_bind_template_child (widget_class, TextViewerWindow, main_text_view);
  gtk_widget_class_bind_template_child (widget_class, TextViewerWindow, open_button);
  gtk_widget_class_bind_template_child (widget_class, TextViewerWindow, cursor_pos);
}

Add the text_viewer_window_finalize function, which clears the GSettings instance and chains up to the parent implementation

static void
text_viewer_window_finalize (GObject *gobject)
{
  TextViewerWindow *self = TEXT_VIEWER_WINDOW (gobject);

  g_clear_object (&self->settings);

  G_OBJECT_CLASS (text_viewer_window_parent_class)->finalize (gobject);
}

Open the window.py file
Modify the instance initialization function for TextViewerWindow to create the GSettings instance for the com.example.TextViewer schema id

def __init__(self, **kwargs):
    super().__init__(**kwargs)

    open_action = Gio.SimpleAction(name="open")
    open_action.connect("activate", self.open_file_dialog)
    self.add_action(open_action)

    save_action = Gio.SimpleAction(name="save-as")
    save_action.connect("activate", self.save_file_dialog)
    self.add_action(save_action)

    buffer = self.main_text_view.get_buffer()
    buffer.connect("notify::cursor-position", self.update_cursor_position)

    self.settings = Gio.Settings(schema_id="com.example.TextViewer")

Open the window.vala file
Modify the TextViewer.Window class to include a Settings property and initialize it with the com.example.TextViewer schema id

namespace TextViewer {
    public class Window : Adw.ApplicationWindow {
        // ...

        private Settings settings = new Settings ("com.example.TextViewer");

        // ...
    }
}

Open the window.js file
Modify the TextViewerWindow class to include a _settings property and initialize it with the com.example.TextViewer schema id

export const TextViewerWindow = GObject.registerClass({
    GTypeName: 'TextViewerWindow',
    Template: 'resource:///com/example/TextViewer/window.ui',
    InternalChildren: ['main_text_view', 'open_button', 'cursor_pos'],
}, class TextViewerWindow extends Adw.ApplicationWindow {
    _settings = new Gio.Settings({ schemaId: 'com.example.TextViewer' });

    constructor() {
        // ...
    }

    // ...
);

Bind the settings to the window state properties#

Keys inside a GSettings schema can be bound to GObject properties; bound properties will be automatically saved inside the settings database whenever they change, and will be restored at creation time.

Modify the TextViewerWindow instance initialization function to bind the window-width, window-height, and window-maximize keys to the default-width, default-height, and maximized properties, respectively

static void
text_viewer_window_init (TextViewerWindow *self)
{
  gtk_widget_init_template (GTK_WIDGET (self));

  g_autoptr (GSimpleAction) open_action = g_simple_action_new ("open", NULL);
  g_signal_connect (open_action, "activate", G_CALLBACK (text_viewer_window__open), self);
  g_action_map_add_action (G_ACTION_MAP (self), G_ACTION (open_action));

  g_autoptr (GSimpleAction) save_action = g_simple_action_new ("save-as", NULL);
  g_signal_connect (save_action, "activate", G_CALLBACK (text_viewer_window__save), self);
  g_action_map_add_action (G_ACTION_MAP (self), G_ACTION (save_action));

  GtkTextBuffer *buffer = gtk_text_view_get_buffer (self->main_text_view);
  g_signal_connect (buffer,
                    "notify::cursor-position",
                    G_CALLBACK (text_viewer_window__cursor_position),
                    self);

  self->settings = g_settings_new ("com.example.TextViewer");

  g_settings_bind (self->settings, "window-width",
                   G_OBJECT (self), "default-width",
                   G_SETTINGS_BIND_DEFAULT);
  g_settings_bind (self->settings, "window-height",
                   G_OBJECT (self), "default-height",
                   G_SETTINGS_BIND_DEFAULT);
  g_settings_bind (self->settings, "window-maximized",
                   G_OBJECT (self), "maximized",
                   G_SETTINGS_BIND_DEFAULT);
}

def __init__(self, **kwargs):
    super().__init__(**kwargs)

    open_action = Gio.SimpleAction(name="open")
    open_action.connect("activate", self.open_file_dialog)
    self.add_action(open_action)

    save_action = Gio.SimpleAction(name="save-as")
    save_action.connect("activate", self.save_file_dialog)
    self.add_action(save_action)

    buffer = self.main_text_view.get_buffer()
    buffer.connect("notify::cursor-position", self.update_cursor_position)

    self.settings = Gio.Settings(schema_id="com.example.TextViewer")
    self.settings.bind("window-width", self, "default-width",
                       Gio.SettingsBindFlags.DEFAULT)
    self.settings.bind("window-height", self, "default-height",
                       Gio.SettingsBindFlags.DEFAULT)
    self.settings.bind("window-maximized", self, "maximized",
                       Gio.SettingsBindFlags.DEFAULT)

namespace TextViewer {
    public class Window : Adw.ApplicationWindow {

        // ...

        public Window (Gtk.Application app) {
            Object (application: app);
        }

        construct {
            var open_action = new SimpleAction ("open", null);
            open_action.activate.connect (this.open_file_dialog);
            this.add_action (open_action);

            var save_action = new SimpleAction ("save-as", null);
            save_action.activate.connect (this.save_file_dialog);
            self.add_action (save_action);

            Gtk.TextBuffer buffer = this.text_view.buffer;
            buffer.notify["cursor-position"].connect (this.update_cursor_position);

            this.settings.bind ("window-width", this, "default-width", SettingsBindFlags.DEFAULT);
            this.settings.bind ("window-height", this, "default-height", SettingsBindFlags.DEFAULT);
            this.settings.bind ("window-maximized", this, "maximized", SettingsBindFlags.DEFAULT);
        }
    }
}

export const TextViewerWindow = GObject.registerClass({
    GTypeName: 'TextViewerWindow',
    Template: 'resource:///com/example/TextViewer/window.ui',
    InternalChildren: ['main_text_view', 'open_button', 'cursor_pos'],
}, class TextViewerWindow extends Adw.ApplicationWindow {
    _settings = new Gio.Settings({ schemaId: 'com.example.TextViewer' });

    constructor(application) {
        super({ application });

        // ...

        this._settings.bind(
            "window-width", this, "default-width", Gio.SettingsBindFlags.DEFAULT);
        this._settings.bind(
            "window-height", this, "default-height", Gio.SettingsBindFlags.DEFAULT);
        this._settings.bind(
            "window-maximized", this, "maximized", Gio.SettingsBindFlags.DEFAULT);
    }

    // ...
});

In this lesson you have added keys to the GSettings schema associated with your application; managed the lifetime of the GSettings instance by tying it to the application window; and bound the keys in the GSettings database to the state properties of your application window.