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This section describes how users execute FMLI commands. A complete discussion of FMLI commands can be found in ``The Form and Menu Language''.
The Command Menu is an FMLI-supplied menu that lists a subset of FMLI commands. By default, function key <F7> is labeled <cmd-menu> when a menu (except the Command Menu itself), form, or text frame is current. Pressing the <cmd-menu> SLK causes the Command Menu to appear in the work area:
| Command Menu | |
|---|---|
| cancel | next-frm |
| cleanup | prev-frm |
| exit | refresh |
| frm-mgmt | unix-system |
| goto | update |
| help | |
The Command Menu will reflect the contents of the commands file. That is, if you rename, redefine, or disable an existing FMLI command in the commands file, or if you define a new command for your application, it will be added to or removed from the Command Menu as appropriate. You execute a command from the Command Menu by selecting it just as you would select an item in any other menu.
You access the FMLI command line by pressing <CTRL-j> or <CTRL-f> <c>. At the --> prompt, you enter the name and arguments, if any, of the FMLI command you want to execute and press <ENTER>. All FMLI commands can be executed from the command line except those you have disabled in the commands file.
If a message catalogue for a certain language exists in your system, the commands in the command menu will be presented in the respective language. Commands in the command line must always be entered in English even though they might be output in another language in the command menu.
If what you enter on the command line is not a known FMLI command, it is interpreted according to the following default behavior. If what you enter is an integer, the command that will be executed defaults to goto integer; if you enter 2, navigation to frame 2 will occur. If what you enter is anything other than an integer or a known FMLI command, the command that will be executed defaults to open what-is-entered.
You can try using the command line now if you are running the example application.
Press
<CTRL-j>,
enter the command
release,
and press
<ENTER>.
This FMLI command returns the release number of the version of FMLI you
are currently running.
The words
FMLI Release 4.2 Pn, where n is the version number,
should be displayed
on the message line.
If the Command Menu is the current frame when you press <CTRL-j> or <CTRL-f> <c>, the Command Menu will disappear and the command the cursor is currently positioned on will appear on the command line after the prompt.
jsh
or
ksh.
For that reason, using
<CTRL-z>
will suspend an FMLI application.
To resume the FMLI application, use the
fg
command.
(See the
sh(1)
manual page for detailed information on job control.)
Pressing a screen-labeled function key (SLK) results in the execution of the command defined for that function key. Many of the default FMLI commands shown on the SLKs can also be selected from the Command Menu or executed from the command line. (Not all FMLI commands shown by default on the SLKs appear in the Command Menu, and vice versa, but all FMLI commands can be executed from the command line.) If you have defined a SLK (either in an initialization file or in a frame definition file) to execute an application-specific command or a different FMLI command from the default, then pressing that SLK will execute the command you have defined for that key.
FMLI provides for international SLKs. User-defined SLKs in initialization or frame definition files can be internationalized with the $$<catalogue_name>:<message_no>:<default_message> syntax. See the section ``Writing an internationalized application'' for more details.
When a menu, form, or text frame is current, function key
<F1>
is labeled
<HELP>
and assigned the FMLI
help
command by default.
Pressing the
<HELP>
SLK or selecting the help command in
the Command Menu
results in the FMLI
help
descriptor being evaluated.
Typically, you use the
help
descriptor to open a text frame that presents information on the use
of the frame or command.
This can be done using a text frame definition file, or more simply with the
textframe
command.
But you can define
help
to be anything, such as a message to be printed
on the message line
or a UNIX system executable.
On-line help is available for each FMLI command.
You can request help on a command by pressing
<CMD-MENU>
to access the Command Menu,
navigating to the command for which you want help,
and pressing
<HELP>.
You can do the same thing by entering a
command of the form
help command_name
on the command line, where command_name is the name of the command for which you want help.
The on-line help information can be output in languages other than English. To do this, the FMLI message catalogue must be translated.
There are other ways you can provide users with help on the use of
your application.
You can define a short descriptive tag to be displayed alongside
an item in a menu as a ``memory jogger'' on the use
of that item.
The choices menu that you can define for a field in a form
frame can be considered a kind of help.
``Frame definition files''
presents examples of these and other
ways to provide users with on-line help.
Help can also be provided via any of the
FMLI descriptors that display
a message on the message line, such as
choicemsg,
itemmsg,
or
fieldmsg.
The built-in utility
message(1fmli)
can also be used to display information on the message line.
The on-line help can be encoded with the $$-syntax so that output in different languages is possible. If a text file needs to be read (when using the help descriptor and the readfile command), its different language versions should be stored under <dirname>/LANG/<file>. The default version should be stored in <dirname>/<file>.
You can access the UNIX system by selecting the FMLI
unix-system
command from the Command Menu or by
entering the
command_name
on the command line.
When you invoke
unix-system,
the FMLI screen clears and you are put
in a full-screen UNIX shell.
When you exit from the UNIX system,
a prompt message appears requesting that you
press
<ENTER>
to continue.
The FMLI screen
returns in the same condition it was in before the
unix-system
command was issued.
You can control user access to the UNIX shell by disabling the
unix-system
command in the commands file.
(See
``The commands file''
for a discussion of how to disable FMLI commands.)
By default, you can run UNIX system commands from the FMLI command line by prefixing an exclamation mark (!) to the command. (Whitespace is ignored before ! when it is used as a UNIX system escape on the command line.) The built-in function run(1fmli) can also be used to execute UNIX system commands from the FMLI command line (see the run(1fmli) manual page for details). You can use the nobang descriptor to disable these features, as described in ``The initialization file''.