atropos@drycas.club.cc.cmu.edu (09/26/90)
Help!
Does anyone out there use, or UNDERSTAND, DECforms? We are trying to use
it to make some applications at work, but we can't make heads or tails of
the DEC documentation which came with it (we are not all ex-IBM machine
language programmers) and we are fast running up against a time barrier!
We are considering tossing DECforms, and sending in several volumes of
comments about the [lack of] style, coherency, etc., but are willing to
give DECforms /one/ last try. Questions which the manuals either do not
address, or address in a you-need-telepathy-to-understand fashion:
1. Can you have DECforms validate input based on limit which are flexible?
2. Can DECforms read/send/update an individual field on a panel composed
of many fields?
3. Can DECforms call user escapes written in (compiled) BASIC, and if so,
how does one pass parameters to the escape, and what limitations are
there in the escapes?
4. Is it possible to have DECforms do something AFTER all the panel literals
have been displayed, such as call a user-escape? [I have been using
escapes, icons, and such to display some ReGIS graphics, but 'forms
makes the display of graphics on top of the form nearly impossible,
without extensive gyrations and sacrifices to ancient godlings]
There are more questions, and certainly will be many more, but for the moment
these will do. I've been spending /HOURS/ trying to decipher the technobabble
in the manuals, flipping back and forth between sections loyally. I am limited
to writing the application programs in BASIC, and cannot escape that. We are
severely limited in time here, thanks to three weeks trying to get forms to do
much of anything -- DEC Customer Service has been practically useless [after a
reoply I got which consisted basically of "gee, we're sorry", we gave up] and
the sample program, while helpful in some cases, simply won't hack it compared
to decent docs.
Thanks for putting up with my mail -- I am under a lot of stress with this
package, and need to get any replies that you can give sent /ASAP/. DO NOT
REPLY TO THIS NET.ADDRESS, OR TO THE LIST. I cannot read the news during the
day (terminal incompatibility with host/TELNET) so *_/PLEASE/_* send any and
all replies to EL407006@BrownVM.Brown.EDU. Thank-you.
Virtually,
David B. O'Donnell
EL407006@BrownVM.Brown.EDU / UserGSKS@MTS.RPI.EDU / Atropos@Drycas.Club.CC.CMU
List Owner, Belief-L (Personal Ideologies Discussion List)