.c ;FILEIND .p 5 There seems to be a trend toward allowing processes to be optionally controlled by files. The indirect command file processor is an example of this trend. The use of indirect command files in the Sysgen process has undoubtably saved countless person hours. The processes controlled by indirect command files are not wholly unsupervised however. The user may effect the process by his answers to various questions, which are caused by the .ASK, .ASKS, and .ASKN commands in the command file. This allows the user to specify various options during Sysgen for example. However questions asked by the indirect command file processor can be annoying, especially if 90 percent of them have answered before in exactly the same way. The solution to this problem is to carry the trend of allowing optional control by files one step further. Allow the user to optionally provide a file to be used for the answers for all questions asked by an indirect file. Furthermore allow the user to require that all his answers be recorded in such a file. This DECUS magtape contains modifications to the indirect command file processor which allows all of the above to be done. .p 5 Using the modified indirect command file processor one can do the following: do a Sysgen recording all answers on a disk file. Later when one finds that one of the answers has been answered incorectly, one can edit the file created by the Sysgen and do a new Sysgen using the answers in the edited file as the answers to the questions that would normally be asked by the indirect command file. Thus one could just start the second Sysgen and go home and return later to find the Sysgen completed except for the VMR phase. Of course one could not do this if files needed to be edited in Sysgen2 but one could do this manually before starting the Sysgen. .p 5 To be specific the following modifications have been made to the indirect processor: .lm 10 1)A new switch /PA:XX allows the user to specify a two character string which will cause a PAUSE if encountered as the first two characters of the answer to any question. After AT. is restored the question will be asked again. .br 2)Commands of the following form are allowed: .nf @FILE,REM .f Where REM could be any valid RSX11M 3.1 file specification and the default type is CON. This will cause a file REM.CON to be created which will store all answers given by the user. The records of this file are in the following form: .nf XC .f The first character X is eighter a blank or an "E". If it is "E" it means that the answer was terminated by an escape. The second character is always an "C". represents the question that was asked. represents the user's answer. .br 2)Commands of the following form can also be given: .nf @FILE=REM .f Where REM is as before except that now all answers to questions are taken from REM.CON. There are two formats for the records of REM.CON. The first is shown above and the second is as follows: .nf XY .f Where Y is any character but "C" and represents the user's answer. In the first case the indirect command file processor will check that the recorded question is identical to the question that would normally be asked. If the questions are not identical AT. will exit with the message: .nf CHECKING: QUESTION DOES NOT MATCH. .f In the second case no checking will occur. As before the first character X is eighter a blank or an "E". If it is an "E" it will cause the indirect command file processor to behave as if the answer had been terminated by an escape. .lm 0 To build the modified indirect command file processor, PIP all files on the magtape to SY:[2,4] then invoke the indirect file: .nf @FILEIND .f The author of these modifications is: .nf .lm 30 Paul Elliott Technology Incorporated 17511 El Camino Real Houston, Texas 77058