| More docs on the ARB website. See also index of helppages. Last update on 10. Sep 2018 .

Main topics:

- ARB: a Short Introduction
- User masks

Related topics:

- ARB Command Interpreter (ACI)
- Search and Replace Tool (SRT)
- Regular Expressions (REG)

# User mask syntax description

- OCCURRENCE
- DESCRIPTION

## OCCURRENCE

### In all user mask files.

## DESCRIPTION

### This document describes the syntax of user masks (*.mask files)

    <mask-file>         ::= <id-line>
                            [<parameter-line>]+
                            '@MASK_BEGIN'
                            [<mask-layout-line>]+
                            '@MASK_END'

    <id-line>           ::= 'ARB-Input-Mask'<cr>

    <parameter-line>    ::= '@'<parameter-name>'='<value><cr>
    <parameter-name>    ::= name of the parameter (i.e. 'ITEMTYPE')
    <value>             ::= the value of the parameter (depends on parameter)

    <mask-layout-line>  ::= <widget>[','<widget>]*
    <widget>            ::= <widget-name>'('<widget-parameters>')'
    <widget-name>       ::= name of the widget (i.e. 'EDIT')
    <widget-parameters> ::= <widget-parameter>[','<widget-parameter>]*

    <widget-parameter>  ::= <numeric-parameter> | <text-parameter>
    <numeric-parameter> ::= [0-9]+
    <text-parameter>    ::= "text"

    <cr>                ::= a newline character

### Parameter lines:

    <parameter-name>        mandatory?  allowed <value>s
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    ITEMTYPE                yes         'Species', 'Organism', 'Gene' or 'Experiment'

    TITLE                   no          the title of the window

    X_SPACING               no          x-spacing between mask elements (default: 5)
    Y_SPACING               no          y-spacing --------- " --------- (default: 3)

    EDIT                    no          0|1 (1 => show edit/reload buttons)

### Known Widgets:

Format of the following descriptions:
<widget> "description" description of <widget-parameters>
TEXT(text) "prints text to window"

    <text>         mandatory; Text appearing

NEW_SECTION() "starts a new section"
TEXTFIELD(label,db-path,width) "a text input field"

    <label>        mandatory; Label appearing in front of input-field
    <db-path>      mandatory; path-name of the database entry (i.e. 'full_name' or 'ali_23s/data')
    <width>        mandatory; width of input field (1..n)

NUMFIELD(label,db-path,width[,[min],[max]]) "a numeric input field" Note: all in [ ] is optional

    <label>        mandatory; <like above>
    <db-path>      mandatory; <like above>
    <width>        mandatory; width of input field (1..n)
    <min>          optional; minimum (leave empty for no minimum)
    <max>          optional if <min>; maximum (leave empty for no maximum)

CHECKBOX(label,db-path,checked) "a checkbox"

    <label>        mandatory; <like above>
    <db-path>      mandatory; <like above>
    <checked>      mandatory; 0 or 1 (value is used if database entry is missing)

RADIO(label,db-path,default,orientation[,radio-def]+) "a radio button field" Note: [ ]+ means: must occur once, may occur repeated

    <label>        mandatory; <like above>
    <db-path>      mandatory; <like above>
    <default>      mandatory; 1 .. n (which radio button is active if database entry is missing)
    <orientation>  mandatory; H,V,X,Y (horizontal or vertical)

    <radio-def> ::= <text>,<db-value>
                    or
                    <text>,'ALLOW_EDIT',<width>,<db-value>

    <text>        mandatory; text showing up in window
    <db-value>    mandatory; text used as database content

OPENMASK(button-label,mask-name) "a button opening another mask"

    <button-label> mandatory; Label appearing on button
    <mask-name>    mandatory; User-Mask to activate

CHANGEMASK(button-label,mask-name) "same as OPENMASK but closes current mask"
WWW(button-label,url-srt) "a button to open an URL in the web-browser"

    <button-label> mandatory; Label appearing on button
    <url-srt>      mandatory; ACI/SRT expression which creates an URL (script runs on current item)

ID(id) "assign an identifier to the last element"

    <id>           mandatory; a unique identifier

GLOBAL(id,default) "declare a global variable (visible in ALL masks)"

    <id>           mandatory; a unique identifier
    <default>      mandatory; default value for variable

LOCAL(id,default) "declare a local variable (only visible in CURRENT masks)"

    <id>           mandatory; a unique identifier
    <default>      mandatory; default value for variable

    SCRIPT(id,aci)     "declare a script"

    <id>           mandatory; a unique identifier
    <aci>          mandatory; the script itself (" has to be written as \")

SHOW(label,idref,width) "display/edit a variable or script"

    <label>        mandatory; Label appearing in front of input-field
    <idref>        mandatory; name of an existing identifier
    <width>        mandatory; width of display textfield

ASSIGN(dest,source,button-label) "a button to assign value of 'source' to 'dest'"

    <dest>         mandatory; ID of destination (may be a variable, a named field, etc.)
    <source>       mandatory; ID of source (variable, named field, script, etc.)
    <button-label> mandatory; text appearing on button

### Examples for Widgets:

    TEXTFIELD(   "Name   ",  "full_name" , 50  )
    TEXT("Publication:")
    TEXTFIELD(   "Author ",  "author" ,  40  )    ID(AUTHOR)
    TEXTFIELD(   "Title  ",  "title" ,  40  )
    TEXTFIELD(   "Journal",  "journal" ,  30  )

    TEXTFIELD(   "Remark ",  "remark2" ,  50  )

    CHECKBOX(   "Checked ",  "checked" ,  0  ) TEXTFIELD("by","checked_by",8)