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Conference iosg::all-in-1_v30

Title:*OLD* ALL-IN-1 (tm) Support Conference
Notice:Closed - See Note 4331.l to move to IOSG::ALL-IN-1
Moderator:IOSG::PYE
Created:Thu Jan 30 1992
Last Modified:Tue Jan 23 1996
Last Successful Update:Fri Jun 06 1997
Number of topics:4343
Total number of notes:18308

3459.0. "MERGE to screen without pressing RETURN at end?" by BOOZER::MARTIN::BELL (Martin Bell, NETCC, Birmingham UK) Wed Oct 27 1993 12:36

I have a MERGE boilerplate to produce a screen full of information with
various highlighting etc.

Now if i use LIST<MERGE to display this on a screen, the user must press
the RETURN key before i can continue my script. This is no good, as i am
writing an application that automatically updates the screen with the
MERGE output at regular intervals.

I tried a MERGE FRED.BLP, SYS$OUTPUT: command, which displays the output
to the screen without having to press RETURN at the end, but this does
not produce the required highlighting (bold, reverse etc.).

Now perhaps a COPY "<MERGE FRED" "SYS$OUTPUT:" <vt100$dsab> type command
may give me what i need (so says the big book), but does anyone know
the correct DSAB to allow VT100 style highlighting?

Otherwise, can anyone think of a way of displaying a MERGE to the screen
with all highlighting but not requiring the user to press RETURN at the
end?

This is actually ALL-IN-1 v2.4, but i don't think that things have changed
too much since then,

cheers,

mb
T.RTitleUserPersonal
Name		DateLines
3459.1MERGE -> FORMAT -> COPY/TYPEVNABRW::RHOTON_JJohn Rhoton @AUI - DTN 754-2345Wed Oct 27 1993 13:286
    re: .0
    
    Martin,  can't you use the FORMAT function to put it to a file and then
    display the file to the screen?
    
    John
3459.2or even FORMAT "<MERGE xyzzy"BOOZER::MARTIN::BELLMartin Bell, NETCC, Birmingham UKWed Oct 27 1993 13:4914
John,

i tried that, and one nice thing is that you can also pipeline the FORMAT
command to save using a temporary file, but (in v2.4) it displays a message
"Formatting ..." while it does it's stuff. It is also quite a bit slower,
especially when compared to using LIST<MERGE. I also can't remember whether
FORMAT understands REVERSE video as a valid highlight.

The message is not too serious, but for performance (as well as tidyness)
it would be nice to do without all the FORMAT overheads.

Any more ideas?

mb
3459.3OA$MRG_TTOUTIOSG::NEWLANDRichard Newland, IOSG, REO2-G/L2Wed Oct 27 1993 14:105
I have never tried this but the description of MERGE in the APR Vol 2 
describes using the OA$MRG_TTOUT function to direct MERGE outout to the 
terminal.

Richard
3459.4OA$MRG_TTOUT is a debugging toolBOOZER::MARTIN::BELLMartin Bell, NETCC, Birmingham UKWed Oct 27 1993 14:2410
Humm,

i tried OA$MRG_TTOUT as well, but i guess that is intended to be a
debugging tool, rather than for full applications. It seems to only
output on line 24, and my MERGE (which calls scripts etc) causes an
access violation using OA$MRG_TTOUT but works fine with LIST.

cheers,

mb
3459.5VT100 dsab?BOOZER::MARTIN::BELLMartin Bell, NETCC, Birmingham UKThu Oct 28 1993 04:145
    Does anyone know which output DSAB the LIST function uses (if any) when
    outputting to a terminal with VT100 style highlighting. If this can be
    used with the COPY function then maybe it will give me what i need?
    
    mb
3459.6NoneIOSG::NEWLANDRichard Newland, IOSG, REO2-G/L2Thu Oct 28 1993 09:424
The LIST function outputs to the terminal directly using QIOs.

Richard
3459.7BOOZER::MARTIN::BELLMartin Bell, NETCC, Birmingham UKThu Nov 04 1993 10:147
Well in the end i took John's (.1) advice, and FORMATted to a file
and then typed it to the screen. The "Formatting document . . ." appears
on line 24, so a 23 line "document" makes for quite a nice display.

Thanks for all the ideas,

mb