Underline text — labels and list templates

Choose the syntax for the text you are drawing

Context	Syntax	Where to put it
Decorative `eLabel`, named Label component or `render="Label"`	`underline="1"`	On that label/widget
`text` inside an XML list template	`flags="underline"`	On the individual `text` element
A listbox containing many text fields	No universal underline switch for its entries	Change the template’s text fields

The central Boolean accepts 1, yes, true, on, enabled and underline as true, case-insensitively. 0, no, false and off turn it off; other unrecognised strings also evaluate false. A newly constructed native label starts with underlining off.

Ordinary label

Paste these elements inside an existing screen. No new Python component is needed for decorative eLabel elements. The registered Regular font is required.

<eLabel position="20,20" size="600,70" font="Regular;28"
        text="Underlined text" underline="1"
        foregroundColor="#00FFFFFF" backgroundColor="#00203040"
        horizontalAlignment="left" verticalAlignment="top" wrap="noWrap" />
<eLabel position="20,100" size="600,70" font="Regular;28"
        text="Plain text" underline="0"
        foregroundColor="#00FFFFFF" backgroundColor="#00203040"
        horizontalAlignment="left" verticalAlignment="top" wrap="noWrap" />

underline="0"

Example text

underline="1"

Example text

Conceptual illustration, not an Enigma2 screenshot. Actual font metrics, spacing and rendering depend on the receiver and skin.

For a dynamic label use the same attribute on its existing widget, for example name="description" or source="description" render="Label", according to how that screen creates its content. Declaring a name or source in XML does not create the Python object.

Text in an XML list template

This fragment requires an existing Components.Sources.List named list with a text value at tuple index 0. Put it inside that screen. The nested template selects the normal Default template and uses its first font (font="0").

<widget source="list" render="Listbox" position="20,20" size="600,280">
  <template name="Default" fonts="Regular;28" itemHeight="70">
    <text index="0" position="0,0" size="600,70" font="0"
          horizontalAlignment="left" verticalAlignment="top"
          flags="underline" foregroundColor="#00FFFFFF" />
  </template>
</widget>

Combine text flags with commas, for example flags="blend,underline". Do not use underline="1" as a substitute on this template item: its parser builds drawing flags from flags. Conversely, the central flags handler on a screen expects window flags, not these text flags.

If no underline is visible

Identify the actual drawing path. A Label renderer uses eLabel; a Canvas renderer, RunningText implementation or custom list renderer can draw text itself and may not use the label’s underline state.
Start with one short line, top alignment, no padding and plenty of height, as above. Font line height can exceed the numeric font size. The native painter draws a one-pixel underline and clips it to the drawing area; a short rectangle can hide it while leaving the letters visible.
Check foreground/background contrast and overlapping widgets. The line uses the foreground colour, so it can be subtle.
Check that the skin fragment is actually loaded and look for [Skin] Error: Attribute 'underline' in the Enigma2 log. An older receiver build may lack the setter or drawing support.
Avoid using this as a multiline text-decoration guarantee. In this snapshot the painter derives one underline rectangle from the text bounding box; marked/editing text has separate branches that can take precedence.

The exact reason for an existing skin’s missing underline cannot be established without its XML, widget type and receiver build.

Verification

These examples were checked against source revision f4135659cb5ee225efd84db1a944b5f72fa6b2a0; the diagram is an illustration, not a receiver capture. The new snippets have not been visually tested on hardware. Relevant implementations: central attribute handler, template text flags, and native underline painting and clipping.