Commands are used to run powerful subprograms. The command line processor compiles a table-defined syntax into a corresponding preinitialized data structure. This structure is mapped to the parameter structure of the corresponding subprogram. The subprogram can then be executed with the defined arguments/parameters.
To support these variable commands several built-in functions are available and described in a separate chapter.
Command names can be abbreviated for interactive use. See abbreviations for detailed information about abbreviation rules and usage recommendations.
Each supported command is explained in a separate section in this document. Each section contains a synopsis including the help message, the path, the type and the syntax followed by a detailed description.
If an argument of this command is an object or overlay or, if a detailed description is available for this argument, a separate section with synopsis (help, path, type, syntax) and description is written, otherwise a bullet list is printed which contains the keyword, the syntax and the help message.
For the syntax of an overlay braces {} are used to keep all possible
arguments of an overlay logically together. These braces are not part
of the real syntax. The braces are only written to demonstrate
clearly that one of these arguments must be selected with the
DOT operator (optional) for defining the overlay.
To be compatible with certain shells, the features below are implemented:
Commands can be declared in deep hierarchical depth. In order to simplify their handling the path is a powerful instrument for managing only relevant parts of it. Because of that the path is printed for each synopsis.
To run commands under different owners, the owner id can be defined in front of the command.
To suppress the output of the command line executor you can set QUIET or SILENT as the last parameter. In addition to QUIET, SILENT also suppresses the error messages. These options have no effect on the output of the commands and built-in functions.
For job control, the maximum (and minimum) condition code
(MAXCC=[max][-min]) of the command execution can optionally be set as
the last parameter for each command. The value 'max' is the maximum
condition code. If the condition code, that would be returned if MAXCC
was not specified, would be greater than 'max', it is reduced to the
value of 'max'. If the condition code would be smaller than 'min', the
actually returned condition code is reduced to 0. Both, 'max' and 'min',
values are optional. To only specify the minimum, simply omit the 'max'
value, i.e. the MAXCC value starts with a hyphen.
Example: The clause MAXCC=8-4 will set each condition code
greater than 8 to 8 and each condition code smaller than 4 to 0,
while MAXCC=-4 only sets condition codes smaller than 4 to 0.
flam4 [OWNER=oid] command "... argument list ..." [MAXCC=[max][-min]] [QUIET] flam4 [OWNER=oid] command=" parameter file name " [MAXCC=[max][-min]] [QUIET]
The parameters for each command can be provided as an argument list on the command line or as a parameter file.