VUE

A-Shell contains an implementation of VUE with a similar look, feel, and functionality to AlphaVue version 3.0 under AMOS. Most basic commands and display mode features are implemented, although the emphasis is on general utility and not on being a perfect emulation of the AMOS version. Some extended features have been added to accommodate the needs of our more demanding users; see Special Commands.

Switch	Effect of Switch
/C	Enable command file input (including in display mode). Characters are input from the current command file and interpreted as if they were typed. Note that it is critical to know which mode the session will start in (display vs. command) since the interpretation of the commands would differ between the modes. See the START command in the ini.vue file for info on starting in a specified mode.
/R	Read-only mode. All functions work normally except you cannot save the file. You might want to consider EZTYP as an alternative to this.
/T	Trace steps involved in locating and processing the ini.vue file. Useful for debugging.
/W	Start in 132 column (wide) mode.
/Y	Automatically answer affirmatively to the question about whether to create a non-existent file.

The Help command is fully implemented. Enter Help while in command mode to get several successive screens showing all available VUE commands, which are also listed in tables in this documentation. Also available from the VUE command line are help screens for INFLD (e.g. >HELP INFLD), INMEMO, TCRT, and SPOOL. To create your own help screen for the subject "ABC," create a file called ABC.HLV in [7,1] and invoke it by entering "HELP ABC" on the VUE command line.

History

2016 May, A-Shell 6.3.1511, VUE edit 370: VUE now disables AutoMouse on the ATE client during the VUE session, then restores the prior settings on exit. Previously, this only occurred for A-Shell/Windows local mode. Note that if the ATE version is prior to 6.3.1511.0, AutoMouse will get disabled on entry into VUE, but not restored on exit.

2011 April, A-Shell build 1214, VUE edit 307: VUE now uses the AG_STATUSLINES feature to save the present status line configuration and then enable the bottom status line (which is used by VUE to display important information during editing). On exit, the previous status configuration is restored.

2010 November, A-Shell build 1196, VUE edit 305: A new variation of the >FORMAT command allows reformatting (wrapping) one line at a time to a specified width:

>FORMAT #

where # is the desired wrap width.

Unlike the standard FORMAT command, which reformats a paragraph using word wrap so that each line is as long as possible without exceeding the current width specified by the WIDTH command, FORMAT # operates on only the current line, wrapping it at exactly the specified width. This is mostly just a convenience for getting an overview of an extremely long line (as an alternative to successively using the >MARGIN # command, or RightArrow, to view one screen width at a time).

2010 November, A-Shell build 1196, VUE edit 304: The old line length limit of 2022 bytes has been greatly expanded. For existing files, the new limit is 1000 bytes longer than the longest of the first 100 lines in the file. For new files, the limit is 4K.

Also, the line concatenation function (^o) now beeps and otherwise does nothing when the concatenated line would exceed the current limit. (Previously it just truncated without warning.)