MUIbase offers several preferences items the user can set to his likes. This chapter shows what preferences items are available and gives general information about how the preferences system works.
MUIbase does not need to keep all records of a project in memory. Instead it uses a buffer for holding only a small number of records. By choosing a value from menu item `Preferences - Record memory' you can set the size of this buffer. Each project has its own buffer, so if you have opened two projects each having a record buffer size of 1MB, MUIbase will use up to 2MB for the records of both projects.
MUIbase will not allocate the memory a priori, it uses a dynamic allocation scheme. Also, the buffer size you specify is not a hard limit. If MUIbase decides it needs more memory then it will try to allocate it.
Once the buffer gets full, or if MUIbase runs out of memory, all records are flushed from the buffer. This means that unchanged records are simply freed and changed records are first written to disk and then freed.
By giving MUIbase a higher value for the record buffer you will notice a speed increase in accessing the records because now since more records are held in memory fewer records have to be loaded from disk. If you set the record memory size to `unlimited' and all records fit into memory then MUIbase operates with optimal speed.
You should check menu item `Preferences - Record delete requester' if you want MUIbase to pop up a safety requester asking for confirmation whenever you try to delete a record. Leave the item unchecked if records should be deleted silently. Default is checked.
You can check menu item `Preferences - External editor for programming' if you always want to use the external editor for editing MUIbase programs. This means that whenever you open the program editor, the external editor is also started automatically. If you don't check this field then you can still launch the external editor by choosing the corresponding item in the editor's context menu. Default is unchecked.
Check menu item `Preferences - Icon creation' if you want MUIbase to create an icon for each project. You can still paint and use your own icon for a project. MUIbase will not overwrite existing icon images as long as they are project icons. Default is checked.
By selecting menu item `Preferences - Set formats' you can specify the formats used when displaying or printing real and date values. After selecting the menu item a new window appears containing the following items:
The initial values for real and date formats are determined according to the information found in the operating system's `Locale' library.
When you are done with all settings, press the `Ok' button to leave the window and update the display.
By selecting menu item `Preferences - Icon tool name' you specify the tool name that should be executed when you double click a project icon. Normally you should specify the path to the MUIbase program, e.g. `MUIbase:MUIbase' which is the default.
MUIbase's editor fields offer a special menu item where you can call an external editor for editing the text contents. The name of the editor and its parameters must be specified by selecting menu item `Preferences - External editor'. You should enter a command string that gets executed when calling the external editor. Use `%f' at the place where the filename normally stands. The `%f' string is replaced with the actual filename of the temporary file MUIbase creates before executing the command.
For example you can use `CED %f -keepio' for using CED as external editor (make sure that your default stack size is at least 8192 bytes in size, otherwise CED might crash).
Default is `Ed %f'.
In MUIbase you can use strings for storing filenames. For displaying the contents of such a filename, an external viewer is needed. Normally this viewer uses the Amiga-OS datatype system for displaying pictures, showing animations, or playing music. To specify this viewer select menu item `Preferences - External viewer'.
Like for the external editor (see section External editor) you have to specify a command string here. Default is `Multiview %f'.
In the graphical user interface entered in the structured editor there might exist popup buttons, e.g. file, font or listview popups beneath a string gadget. These buttons are usually not included in the cycle chain, that is, you can't use the Tab key to activate them. However if you check menu item `Preferences - Popups in cycle chain' then all popup buttons are include in the cycle chain.
Please note that changing the status of this menu item has only an effect after rebuilding the user interface, e.g. by switching to the structure editor and back to the user interface.
Saving and reorganizing a project can take quite some time depending on the size of the project. Therefore, if you select menu item `Project - Save & Reorg' or `Project - Save & reorg as', a safety requester pops up asking for confirmation of this operation.
The requester only appears if menu item `Preferences - Confirm save & reorg' is checked, thus you can disable this requester by de-selecting the menu item.
If you try to quit MUIbase and there are unsaved projects then MUIbase pops up a safety requester asking for confirmation. However if all projects have been saved, the program usually quits silently.
If you want MUIbase to always pop-up a requester when quitting then check menu item `Preferences - Confirm quit'. In this case you always get a safety requester when selecting menu item `Project Quit'. Nevertheless it is still possible to quit MUIbase silently by closing all projects.
The programming feature of MUIbase allows to include external sources within the project's program (see section #include for more information). Menu item `Program - Include directory' allows to set a directory where MUIbase should search for such include files. Default is `MUIBase:Include'.
For compiling a project's program, you can choose whether debug information should be included in the executeable or not. If you compile without debug information and a run-time error occurs then an error discription is generated but there is no information about where exactly the error occured. If you compile with debug information then you also get the exact error location.
Use menu item `Program - Debug information' to turn debug information for compilation on and off. After changing this state, don't forget to recompile the project's program by choosing menu item `Program - Compile'.
When executing a MUIbase program all output which is directed to `stdout' can be printed to a file. The filename has to be entered in the requester that appears when choosing menu item `Program - Output file'. Here, you can also specify if the file should be opened in appended mode or if it should be cleared before the first output happens. Besides traditional files, the Amiga-OS system allows several special filenames here, e.g.:
MUIbase can manage several projects and for each project you can have your own set of preferences. Sometimes however it is desirable to have all projects sharing the same setting for one of the preferences items. This is realized by using a status flag for each preferences item which indicates whether each project has its own value for this field or if the value is shared among all projects.
By choosing menu item `Preferences - Project dependent settings' a window with a list of several preferences items appears. All items in this list can be set either project dependent or global. The list contains the following items:
The status flag of preferences items not included in this list cannot be changed and is either project dependent or global, e.g. the setting of preferences item `icon tool name' is always global since it doesn't make sense to have different icon tool names for different projects.
If you check the box to the right of a preferences item then this item is made project dependent, otherwise it is global. Project dependent settings are stored in the project file `Structure.mb', whereas global settings are stored in a global preferences file.
Since MUIbase is a MUI application you can also specify the MUI preferences for this application by choosing menu item `Preferences - MUI'.
The global preferences can be loaded and saved to disk. When MUIbase is started, it automatically loads its preferences from `ENV:MUIbase.prefs'.
MUIbase doesn't save its global preferences automatically. Thus, if you make changes to the global preferences and you want MUIbase to remember them after a restart then you have to save them by choosing menu item `Preferences - Save preferences'. The global preferences are written to both `ENVARC:MUIbase.prefs' and `ENV:MUIbase.prefs'. The following items are stored:
There is also a menu item called `Preferences - Load preferences'. Choose this menu item in case you made changes to the preferences and want to go back to the previously saved version.
If you start MUIbase without loading any projects then MUIbase opens a window with an empty display. The empty display usually consists of a image which is loaded from the file `MUIbase:Images/EmptyWindow.iff'.
By default this image is the MUIbase logo but you can replace it by copying your favorite picture to `MUIbase:Images/EmptyWindow.iff'. It is also possible to have no image for the empty display window, just make sure that the above filename doesn't exist. In this case MUIbase only prints the text `Empty display' in the window.
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