🚀 PoshUI v1.5.1 — Launchpad: How to Structure a PoshUI App

Every PoshUI example so far has been a single script. Launchpad is a learning example: a complete app laid
out as a project, so you can see how to build on PoshUI before you build something of your own. A front end that
only draws, a back end with no UI in it, a content folder other people drop scripts into, a check script, tests,
a launcher exe, and a guide that walks through every layer. Copy it, swap the sample scripts for yours, and keep
the structure.

This release also fixes light/dark switching on pages with a data grid, unreadable data grid rows
(#10), app launchers started from PowerShell 7, the folder
picker's dialog, the number field's buttons, and the Hello example that shipped broken in 1.5.0.

Nothing breaks. Existing scripts run unchanged. Two additions: Add-UICanvasMarkdown -BasePath (pictures in
markdown), and Add-UICanvasDataGrid takes -Properties @{ SelectionMode = 'Multiple' }.

🚀 Launchpad

Examples\Launchpad\ in the release package. Double-click Launchpad.exe.

Everything in that clip is PowerShell. You don't build a page for each script: Launchpad reads the script's comment help and param() block and builds its page and form for you, and the output streams in as it runs. The workflow stops at an approval, waits (it would survive closing the app), and picks up again from the history page. The theme switches live. The scripts inside are stand-ins; the structure is what you take away. → Structuring an App: Building Launchpad

🆕 What's new in 1.5

What it shows you how to build:

• Pages built from content. Drop a folder into Content\scripts\ and it appears: the script's comment help
  becomes the card, its param() becomes the form (text, number, toggle, dropdown, file and folder pickers),
  Write-Host streams into the output, and the last object it returns is a coloured result.
• Workflows that chain scripts with decisions: a step's result picks the next step, a step can ask a
  question, ask for more input, show rows to pick from, or wait for an approval. Decide later leaves a run
  waiting on disk; it carries on from that step when someone approves it, even after the app was closed.
• Run history that a page reads back when you return to it, and a Settings page that clears it (never a
  live run, and never a waiting one unless you say so).
• Live light and dark, search and filters, and a splash screen.

The structure is the point

Launchpad\
  Launchpad.exe, .app.json, .config   the launcher - the only things at the top
  Content\scripts\<Name>\<Name>.ps1   a script, and its README.md how-to
  Content\workflows\<Name>.psd1       a workflow, and its .md how-to
  App\Launchpad.ps1                   FRONT END - draws, never works
  App\lib\Runner.ps1                  BACK END  - no UI cmdlet in it
  App\ui\                             frame, colours, workflow pages, splash
  App\config.psd1  Check.ps1  Tests\  settings, the gate, the engine's tests

• Content never needs a code change. Categories, forms, icons, "used by", everything on the cards is read
  from the scripts and workflows.
• The back end runs anywhere: in the window, in Check.ps1, in a console, in 30 Pester tests.
• Drop-ins are checked. A script that doesn't parse, a name that clashes, a required value left empty, a
  Read-Host that would hang: each is caught and explained instead of breaking a run.
• Safety is a setting. RequireSigned runs only signed scripts. TimeoutMinutes stops a runaway. Every
  run has Cancel.

New guide: Structuring an App: Building Launchpad.
How to write a script for it, how workflows route, the five ideas the app is built on, and how to make it
yours.

🔧 Fixed

• Light/dark switching stopped part-way on any page with a data grid. Since 1.5.0, theme colours are shared
  live brushes. The data grid's styles froze them, so the next switch failed: the page and title bar changed,
  but cards, text and the grid stayed in the old theme. Styles no longer freeze them, and a frozen brush can no
  longer stop a switch.
• Data grid rows were unreadable (#10). Every other row
  was a fixed dark navy. Stripes, hover and selection now use tints of the theme's own colours and follow the
  toggle. Use -Properties @{ AlternatingRowBackground = 'None' } or a colour to change them.
• Data grid columns collapsed on pages that don't give the grid a width: the headers vanished and cells
  were cut to two letters. Columns now fit their content there, and still fill the width when there is one.
• App launchers started from PowerShell 7 could not find built-in cmdlets such as
  Import-PowerShellDataFile. A MyApp.exe started from a pwsh console, deploy script or installer now runs
  with Windows PowerShell's module path.
• The folder picker opened the old tree-style "Browse For Folder" window. Add-UICanvasFolderPicker and
  Select-UICanvasFolder now open the standard Explorer folder dialog, as the wizard always has.
• The number field's up/down buttons were unthemed grey blocks. They are now flat chevrons inside the field
  that follow the theme.
• Pictures in how-tos. ![caption](diagram.png) in a markdown file now finds the image beside the .md and
  shows it as a figure with its caption. Before, relative images never loaded.
• Secondary windows had a white title bar on a dark app. They now follow the theme, and switch with it.
• The Hello example in 1.5.0 opened with only its label. A missing line break had joined two commands, so
  the text box and buttons never appeared.

✨ Added

• Add-UICanvasDataGrid -Properties @{ SelectionMode = 'Multiple' }: Ctrl/Shift-click selection.
  Get-UICanvasValue returns the selected rows; setting the value to $true selects all, $null clears.
• The release package ships the example launchers (Launchpad.exe, Hello.exe) pre-built. They are unchanged
  copies of the signed PoshUI.exe, so they carry its signature.

📦 Versions

PoshUI.exe is Authenticode-signed, and so are the example launchers built from it. Check with
Get-AuthenticodeSignature .\bin\PoshUI.exe.

📋 Requirements

📖 Documentation

Full documentation: https://kanders-ii.github.io/PoshUI/

• Structuring an App: Building Launchpad
• Staging & Delivery: launchers, shortcuts, signing

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