Do an action while any checkbox state is modified with Qt - c++

Question

In my programm, I fill my interface with a lot of checkbox by this way :
void VGCCC::addMaterialToUI(QDomNodeList _materialNodeList, QWidget* _areaWidget, QLayout* _layout, QWidget* _layoutWidget, int _maTable)
{
for(int i=0; i< _materialNodeList.count();i++)
{
QDomElement materialElement = _materialNodeList.at(i).toElement();
QString elementFile = materialElement.attribute("file");
QString elementId = materialElement.attribute("id");
QString elementLabel = elementId;
elementLabel += " - ";
elementLabel += materialElement.attribute("label");
QCheckBox* checkbox = new QCheckBox(elementLabel);
_layout->addWidget(checkbox);
_layoutWidget->adjustSize();
_areaWidget->setMinimumHeight(_layoutWidget->height());
_areaWidget->setMinimumWidth(_layoutWidget->width());
configuration c;
c.path = (m_igmPath+elementFile).toStdString();
c.id = elementId.toInt();
c.name = elementLabel.toStdString();
if(_maTable==0)
{
m_materialSectionMap[checkbox] = c;
}
else
{
m_materialPostMap[checkbox] = c;
}
}
}
I would like to know how to retrieve these "abstract" checkbox. More exactly, if one of these checkbox is checked, I would like to call another function like this :
connect(anyCheckbox,SIGNAL(stateChanged(anyCheckbox)), this, SLOT(doSomethingFunctionIfCheckboxIsChecked()));
The difficulty is that in my UI, these checkbox didn't exist, so I can't connect them to my function. How can I solve it ?

Answer 1

You can e.g. collect pointers to your checkbox objects to a list so can access or "retrieve" them later.
You can connect each checkbox's stateChanged signal to a same slot which is then called when state of any of the checkboxes is changed. In the slot you can cast the sender() to a checkbox if you need to know which specific checkbox is in question. Another alternative is to use QSignalMapper.
In your class declaration:
private slots:
void checkboxStateChanged(int state)
private:
QList<QCheckBox*> m_checkboxes;
In your class definition:
void VGCCC::addMaterialToUI(QDomNodeList _materialNodeList, QWidget* _areaWidget, QLayout* _layout, QWidget* _layoutWidget, int _maTable)
{
...
QCheckBox* checkbox = new QCheckBox(elementLabel);
m_checkboxes.append(checkbox);
connect(checkbox, SIGNAL(stateChanged(int)), this, SLOT(checkboxStateChanged(int)));
...
}
void VGCCC::checkboxStateChanged(int state)
{
// Here your can e.g. call doSomethingFunctionIfCheckboxIsChecked()
QCheckBox* checkbox = qobject_cast<QCheckBox*>(sender());
if (checkbox)
{
// checkbox points to the object whose state changed
}
}