A-Shell Reference

Value

Description

||]

(bar bar close bracket) Prevents field width from being automatically expanded by logic that attempts to allow for the extra space needed by various GUI enhancements. For example, combo boxes smaller than six characters wide typically get an extra three characters of width to account for the space needed for the dropdown button. Similar rules apply to date and time pickers as well.

||[

(bar bar open bracket) causes the redisplayed field to grow as needed for the contents. (This was once part of the ||] code but has been removed in order to avoid slight differences in field display widths which give such screens a ragged look.)

||/

(bar bar slash) Removes the "client edge"—which combines a border and an internal margin—from the edit box. This is useful mainly to make the edit control blend into a background, perhaps related to creating a composite combining an edit control with other text on a static panel, and/or to achieve a "clean" look.

||*

Enable Password Encryption.

|*

Disable Password Encryption.

||a

Activate Auto-Complete mode.

||b

For checkboxes, causes the current state of the checkbox to override the normal default state (i.e. the default based on the type codes if opcode=0, or the contents of the entry parameter if opcode=1 or 2). Useful when the checkbox statement may have been changed by clicking on it outside of the awareness of the application. Same effect as cmdflg=4.

||c

Convert Y/N Field To Checkbox.

||C

Causes a field which would normally appear as a combo box or a date picker while editing (see setdef, dates) to also appear as a combo box when not actively being edited. Otherwise, these kinds of fields revert to static text controls when not active. See Active Versus Inactive Behavior.

|E

Causes the field to retain the form of an edit control when not active. (Otherwise, fields normally revert to static text controls when not active.) Also see ||C and Active Versus Inactive Behavior.

|f

Reserved for internal use ATE in GUI mode to control function key settings

||f

Force Fixed-Pitch Font.

||F

Force Modified Fixed-Pitch Font.

|g

Implies |G, but limits the GUI enhancements to just the Windows-style edit box—i.e. without some of the other automatic enhancements such as date picker controls.

|G

Activate GUI Enhancements.

||g

Disable/override GUI mode. Used to temporarily cancel a global |G or ||G or |g.

||G

Same as |G except turns Y/N fields into checkboxes.

||H

Disable horizontal scrolling within control. Note that the ability to scroll is sometimes needed in order to fit all of the allowed characters, if using proportional fonts and the field consists of wider-than-normal (e.g. CAPS) characters.

||J

Right Justify Checkbox Text.

|K

Select Data Entry Convention.

||K

Acts just like |K but also disables the Ctrl+C abort while the field is active. This allows you to use Ctrl+C for copy-to-clipboard without first having to disable Ctrl+C abort in the application. See also Ctrl+C Behavior.

|m

Prevents the Enter key, when used to select an item from the dropdown list in a combo box, from also causing the field to exit.

|M

Multi-line edit box. xmax sets the display width of the box. maxchrs sets the maximum number of characters allowed (up to a maximum of 1024). defpt is reinterpreted as the height of the box. See ||H for disabling horizontal scrolling (to enable word wrap). Enter (along with any other enabled exit key) exits. See Multi-line Edit Control (INFLD).

||m

Causes exitcode 13 to be returned when an item is selected from the dropdown list (using Enter or click) in a combo box. This allows you to distinguish that event from merely hitting Enter to the field when the dropdown is not displayed. The same effect also applies to fast mode checkboxes, allowing you to distinguish between Enter (which returns exitcode 0) and a click or other keystroke which changes the checkbox value and then exits (with exitcode 13).

||M

Variation of multi-line edit. Allows Enter to be used to manually break lines. Also, displays a vertical scroll bar.

||r

Create A Radio Button.

||s

Makes setdef list matching optional. Only applies to the combo box, in which case it allows the operator to enter a value that is not in the list.

||S

Variation of combo box in which typing a character only selects the nearest matching item from the list. Otherwise the user can type independently of the list, and use Down-Arrow to find the nearest match. See Combo Box Control (INFLD)

||U

Create up/down ("spinner") control. See Up/Down Control (INFLD).

||v

Self Service Date Picker.

||W

Disable the mousewheel within the context of a single combo box field. Added to A-Shell 6.5.1680, June 2020.