This document covers the following topics:
Predict commands can be entered:
On any Predict screen containing the Command ===> prompt. The line containing this prompt is referred to throughout the Predict documentation as the command line.
After the Natural NEXT prompt,
preceded by CMD and separated by blank.
In batch jobs: Retrieval, active retrieval, generation, incorporation and comparison commands are also available in batch mode, but most maintenance commands are not.
The command LAST returns to the Predict
Main Menu and displays the Predict command that was executed last. The command
can then be modified or reexecuted.
Commands can be truncated provided that the input remains
unambiguous. For example, the command GENERATE can
be entered as G since no other command begins with G. However, the command
LOGON must be entered in full, since truncations
(LOGO, LOG etc.) could be confused with the LOGOFF
command.
If the truncated command is ambiguous, the Predict command processor checks whether any accompanying object type is unambiguous. If so, it checks what commands can be applied to this object type.
General and standard Predict commands have the following syntax:
<command> <parameters>
Type-dependent commands have the following syntax:
<command><object-type><object-ID><parameters>
or
<command><object-type><association-type><object-ID><parameters>
| Meaning | |
|---|---|
| <command> | The command used to call a specific function, for
example ADD, COPY,
DISPLAY, RETRIEVE.
Commands are written in upper case throughout the documentation.
|
| <object-type> | Type of object to be processed, for example system or file. |
| <association-type> | Type of association to be processed, for example the
association type for the command LINK.
|
| <object-ID> | ID of the object to be processed. |
| <parameters> | Additional information needed to carry out the function. |
Wherever possible, Predict takes parameter values that are omitted from the context in which a command is entered:
If an object type is omitted, the object type of the current
menu is taken. If for example the command MAINTAIN
is entered in the File Retrieval menu, the File Maintenance menu is
displayed.
Other parameter values are taken from the hot object table as far as possible. See Specifying Parameter Values in the section Predict User Interface in the Introduction to Predict documentation.
Commands can be specified in keyword form, positional form or a mixture of both. Throughout the documentations the command syntax is described in keyword form. The positional form is obtained by omitting the keywords and the Natural assign character (=). The assign character can be changed in Natural.
COMMAND KEY1=value1, KEY2=value2, KEY3=value3
or, if parameter 2 is omitted:
COMMAND KEY1=value1, KEY3=value3, KEY4=value4
COMMAND value1, value2, value3
or, if parameter 2 is omitted:
COMMAND value1,, value3, value4
In the positional form, the omitted parameter is represented by an empty parameter only if followed by other parameters.
The keyword and positional form of specifying command parameters can be mixed.
COMMAND KEY5=value5, value6,, value8
The individual parameters in Predict commands are delimited by the character that is specified as the delimiter character in Natural. Throughout the following descriptions a comma (,) is used as the delimiter character. The delimiter character can be changed in Natural.
The following notations are used in the command descriptions:
| [ ] | Square brackets indicate optional parts of a command that can be omitted. |
| <> | Parameter values are enclosed in angle brackets. Angle brackets must not be typed. Replace text in lower case with an appropriate value. Parentheses can be omitted only when the text they enclose is omitted. |
| KEYWORD | Keywords are shown in upper case and can be truncated provided that the input is unambiguous. |