Does anyone know how to code so that when I hover the mouse over a button the “image” changes?

I am using a custom face for the button and I have all 4 states (normal, down, disabled and hover) But in IB I can ony control the first two.

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Well, IB’s still not going to help you much, but you can subclass NSButton and override mouseEntered:, mouseExited:, and setEnabled:. In each of those methods you can change the image. (Your alternate/down image can probably stay the same the whole time, since it’ll only happen after a hover anyway). That should be enough to get you started…but if you need more help just ask. –JediKnil

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I recently implemented a similar thing in the form of a Hyperlink type button. One tip from someone who knows (I want to save others the trouble of banging their head against the wall for a day…)…make sure you hit test the mouse at the moment the event arrives at the mouseEntered: method of your control, dont just blindly do the rollover. You may find that if a user moves it in and out at a fast enough rate that the event queue gets bogged down with events that ar no longer meaningful and you end up with your control highlighting and unhighligting for a while after. Once you do this you should get the effect you are after.

JKP

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Seems you need to use AddTrackingRect to handle tracking rects before you can even receive mouseEntered: and mouseExited: messages. This is very tricky to get right. I posted some code that might help on the AddTrackingRect page.

–WAHa

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My implementation:

#import “HoverButtonCell.h”

@interface NSButtonCell()

• (void)_updateMouseTracking; @end

@implementation HoverButtonCell @synthesize hoverImage;

• (void)mouseEntered:(NSEvent *)event { if (hoverImage != nil && [hoverImage isValid]) { _oldImage = ([[NSButton *)[self controlView] image] retain]; [(NSButton *)[self controlView] setImage:hoverImage]; } }

• (void)mouseExited:(NSEvent *)event { if (_oldImage != nil && [_oldImage isValid]) { [(NSButton *)[self controlView] setImage:_oldImage]; [_oldImage release]; _oldImage = nil; } }

• (void)_updateMouseTracking { [super _updateMouseTracking]; if ([self controlView] != nil && self controlView] respondsToSelector:@selector(_setMouseTrackingForCell:)]) { [[self controlView] performSelector:@selector(_setMouseTrackingForCell:) withObject:self]; } }

• (void)setHoverImage:([[NSImage *)newImage { [newImage retain]; [hoverImage release]; hoverImage = newImage; self controlView] setNeedsDisplay:YES]; }

• (void)dealloc { [_oldImage release]; [hoverImage release]; [super dealloc]; }

@end

Then the .h file:

#import <Cocoa/Cocoa.h>

@interface [[HoverButtonCell : NSButtonCell { NSImage *_oldImage; NSImage *hoverImage; }

@property (retain) NSImage *hoverImage;

@end

It’s a little hacky, but I hope this helps.

–NP