Defining Alpha Views

view .Input AT . . . ALPHA

 height 20 width 40

 channel COMMANDS

exit

view .InputOutput AT . . . ALPHA

 height 20 aspect 2.0

 channel REQUEST

 channel COMMANDS

exit

Borders and scroll bars cannot be turned off and the area they occupy is in addition to the size you specify for the gadget.

To define the data channel via which the gadget derives its alphanumeric content, use the channel command:

To set the keyboard focus so that keystrokes come to this gadget:

!This.InputOutput.SetFocus()

To clear the text output region of an alpha view use:

!This.InputOutput.clear()

It is not an error to have no associated channels when an alpha gadget is created.

Removing the Requests IO-channel from Alpha View Gadget

To delete the ‘requests’ channel from an alpha view gadget us the command:

!alpha.removeRequests()

This command will also dissociate the view from the current Marine Requests IO-channel if necessary.

Thus request output will no longer go to this alpha view.

The method is valid only on a form that has been mapped to the screen, and will cause an error (61, 605) if used during form definition.

Note that you can add the channel back again by assigning to the gadget’s .channel member:

!alpha.channel = ‘Requests’

This adds the ‘requests’ channel to the gadget, and causes it to become the current Marine requests region, if the form is mapped, and displaces any previous association.

When the user clicks on an alpha view it will automatically associate itself with the Marine requests channel or the commands channels, or both, according to its current channel settings.

The Alpha view gadget supports multiple line copy and paste of text. The simple command window form below shows the appearance.

The bottom-most empty blank line is the command input line, where the user can type in, and execute the next command by pressing the 'enter' key.

The Alpha view allows the following operations:

1. Double-click of any displayed line will copy that line to the command input line ready for editing and execution.

2. You can use standard techniques to select text in the view and then use the right-mouse menu to copy your selection.

3. You can use the right-mouse menu to paste a selection into the command line. Each line of the pasted selection is executed in turn as if you had typed it in, except the last line, which becomes the command input line ready for editing and execution.

4. You can use the right-mouse menu to paste a selection as a macro. The set of pasted lines are captured to a temporary file which is then executed as PML macro. The selected lines are not echoed into the view's display.

5. Pasting of multiple lines is aborted if an error alert is displayed.

6. You can drag and drop a PML file into the view, and it will then execute as a PML macro.

7. The right mouse menu also allows you to clear the contents of the view and to change the size of text in the view's display.