What idea is behind changing Color on Brushes?

[fx.practic]

Here is NT7 code:

ITextFixed info_text = DrawTextFixed("info_text", "some text", TextPosition.TopLeft, Color.FromArgb( 200, 70, 70, 70), new Font("Arial Narrow", 14, FontStyle.Bold), Color.FromArgb( 255, 000, 000, 000), Color.FromArgb( 100, 100, 100, 255), 1);

And here is same NT8 code:

SolidColorBrush unnesessary_text_brush = new SolidColorBrush( Color.FromArgb( 100, 000, 000, 000));
unnesessary_text_brush.Freeze();
SolidColorBrush unnesessary_outline_brush = new SolidColorBrush( Color.FromArgb( 255, 000, 000, 000));
unnesessary_outline_brush.Freeze();
SolidColorBrush unnesessary_area_brush = new SolidColorBrush( Color.FromArgb( 100, 100, 100, 255));
unnesessary_area_brush.Freeze();				
NinjaTrader.Gui.Tools.SimpleFont unnesessary_font  = new NinjaTrader.Gui.Tools.SimpleFont("Courier New", 12) { Size = 50, Bold = true };
TextFixed info_text = Draw.TextFixed(this, "Info_Text", "some text, TextPosition.TopLeft, unnesessary_text_brush, unnesessary_font, unnesessary_outline_brush, unnesessary_area_brush, 1);

Just want to know - what's the idea behind such changes in NT8 NinjaScript?
May be there is more compact way to put fixed text on chart?

At the time I see only one way out: to create add-on and to encapsulate all this code in static methods with short names.

[NinjaTrader_JessicaP]

Thank you for your questions fx.practic. This change was a side effect of using DirectX and WPF to power NT8. While this does add some coding overhead, as you have pointed out, this has dramatically improved NT8 over NT7's use of WinForms technology.

This said, there are ways to take this code on multiple lines and create a long single line of the type you posted for your NT7 code. I would recommend using the BrushConverter class. This is documented at this publicly available link,

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.windows.media.brushconverter.aspx

You can create a brush from a hex value as follows

[FONT=Courier New](SolidColorBrush)(new BrushConverter().ConvertFrom("#abcdef"));[/FONT]

Further, there is no preparation or clean-up of the SimpleFont, as shown in this HelpGuide page,

http://ninjatrader.com/support/helpGuides/nt8/en-us/simplefont_class.htm?zoom_highlightsub=font

Therefore, this, too, can be constructed in a manner similar to the NT7 font you created.

Combining these two pieces of advice leaves you with a single long line of code in both NT7 and NT8. Please let us know if there are any other ways we can help.

[fx.practic]

Thanks a lot. Jessica!
I just can't imagine logical way to find this by myself.

This long line compiled and works fine:

TextFixed info_text = Draw.TextFixed(this, "Info_Text", "info text", TextPosition.TopLeft, (SolidColorBrush)(new BrushConverter().ConvertFrom("#ff808080")), new NinjaTrader.Gui.Tools.SimpleFont("Arial Narrow", 14) { Bold = true },  (SolidColorBrush)(new BrushConverter().ConvertFrom("#00000000")),  (SolidColorBrush)(new BrushConverter().ConvertFrom("#00000000")), 10);