3.1.3 Options Tool
The Options Tool is a tabbed window (
Figure 3–14) in which each tabbed
page allows you to configure different environment settings or perform various
special actions.
For savable settings (Preferences, System and Paths pages)
the options tool include two extra buttons below the page: the
Save as
Defaults button saves the changed preferences and
Restore Defaults retrieves the saved default
settings for the current user. Settings are saved in and read from the
metaedit.ini file in the startup directory.
Preferences settings
The
Preferences page (
Figure 3–14) lets you change object
deletion, relationship creation and toolbar settings:
Figure 3–14. Options Tool: Preferences page.
| 1) | Automatically
delete unused objects. MetaEdit+ allows you to choose
a policy for deletion
operations,
that decides what to do when the user is deleting the last representation of an
object in a graph, and the object is not involved in any relationships in that
graph. This affects the functionality of all tools through which you can delete
design information. Thus, when you use delete functions you should be aware of
the currently selected
policy. |
 | Never:
deletes only the representation and the concept remains part of the graph. This
allows you to reuse it immediately in the graph with the ‘add
existing’ function. The object will still be visible for generators and
browsers on this graph, and for new representations of this
graph. |
| Ask
for each: asks via a dialog each time you delete the last representation,
whether you want to remove the concept from the graph as
well. |
| Always
(the default): removes the concept from the graph when the last representation
of the concept is deleted. This helps ensure that generators and browsers show
the same objects as are visible in tools. The object is no longer available from
that graph, but can still be accessed during this session from the Types
Browser. |
| | To
delete representations of a graph use the Delete Representations...
operation from a Graph, Type or Object Browser: to avoid multiple dialogs
you will be prompted whether you want to temporarily change the setting, if your
default is Ask for
each. |
| | Note
that these settings do not affect relationships and roles: these are always
deleted with their last
representation. |
| 2) | First
object always in first role
defines whether the order of objects
is taken into account during relationship creation. For example when creating an
inheritance relationship in an object diagram MetaEdit+ asks which object is in
the super-class role and which is in the subclass role. By selecting First
object always in first role MetaEdit+ assumes that the object which was selected
first (or the row object in a Matrix Editor) is in the first (super-class) role
and therefore no longer asks about the roles. This option is especially useful
when the language used has directed relationships, e.g. data flows and message
passing. |
| 3) | Type
Toolbar in Editors allows you to
choose what kinds of toolbar are initially visible in editors and how they are
distributed (it is also possible to control toolbar visibility in each editor
window). |
| Show
action toolbar: makes the action toolbar visible by
default. |
| Show
object types: makes the object types toolbar visible by
default. |
| Show
relationship types: makes the relationship types toolbar visible by
default. |
| Actions
on own row: the actions toolbar will be placed on its own row, above the
object and relationship types
toolbars. |
| Relationship
types on own row: the relationship types toolbar will be placed on its own
row, rather than on the same row as the object types
toolbar. |
| Type
Toolbar in Editors allows you to
choose what kinds of toolbar are initially visible in editors and how they are
distributed (it is also possible to control toolbar visibility in each editor
window). |
| 4) | Sidebar
visibility in Diagram Editor contains the settings for the layout of the
Diagram Editor’s sidebar. The following options are
available: |
| Show
sidebar initially controls the
initial visibility of the tree view and property sheet
pane. |
| Sidebar
size defines the initial width of the sidebar (in
pixels) |
| Align
sidebar controls on which side of the Diagram Editor the sidebar is
positioned (left or
right) |
| Tree
percentage defines how much of sidebar’s vertical space is occupied by
the tree view, from the top
down. |
System settings
The
System page (
Figure 3–15) lets you change the
tool functionality related to dialog behavior, window appearance and
performance:
Figure 3–15. Options Tool: System page.
| 1) | Automatically
answer dialogs defines how list dialogs behave
depending on how many items they
contain: |
| Never
tells the system never to automatically answer a list dialog, and thus show even
empty dialogs. With this option the user can see all selection dialogs and get
all information about the tool functions.
|
| Empty
automatically answers list dialogs containing no items, normally effectively
canceling the current action.
|
| One
Item (the default) automatically selects and accepts the item in list
dialogs with only one item available, and behaves like Empty when there are no
items. |
| 2) | Window
options contains preferences for how windows are
opened and how they are
labeled: |
| Prompt
for window area determines whether you are prompted for the position and
size of windows when they are opened. If so, an empty rectangle appears first,
and you can position its top left corner with the mouse, then click and drag to
move the bottom right corner to set the size. If not, the window opens straight
away centered on the current cursor
position. |
| In
the Window label prefix field you can define the
text that is shown in the beginning of the window caption text for all windows
in this MetaEdit+ session. This can be useful if you have multiple instances of
MetaEdit+ open simultaneously.
|
| Shift
wants lock on open changes the MetaEdit+ behavior that opening an editor or
property dialog tries to get the lock for editing, unless shift is held down. If
set to true, this reverses the behavior of shift, so shift must be held down to
get the
lock. |
| 3) | Diagram
Editor options alter the behavior of the Diagram
Editor: |
| Zoom
large diagrams to fit when opening sets how the large diagrams are opened
into the Diagram Editor. When this option is enabled, diagrams that at 100% zoom
would occupy an area larger than the current screen are zoomed to fit the screen
when opened. When the option is disabled, diagrams are opened at 100% zoom, so
not all their contents are visible in the editor window and you must scroll to
see all the
contents. |
| Diagram
pop-up menu selects first allows you to choose whether clicking with the
right mouse button over an unselected element in the Diagram or Symbol Editor
first selects that element, then opens its pop-up menu. If this option is not
chosen, clicking with the right mouse button anywhere in the Diagram or Symbol
Editor will open the pop-up menu for the currently selected element. In that
case, to open the pop-up menu for a different element you must first select that
element with the left mouse button and then open the pop-up menu with the right
mouse
button. |
| 4) | Performance
settings will affect various display and runtime functions:
|
| Use
Cairo if available setting toggles the use of the Cairo graphics library. As
Cairo provides enchanted high-quality graphics with anti-aliasing it is
recommended to use it if the library is present on your system. MetaEdit+
installs the Cairo library on Windows, and uses the existing library on Linux.
If the library is not found, this setting will be
disabled. |
| Fill
increment adjusts the step size of the shading in fountain fills. Increasing
this value speeds up the drawing of the fountain fills by reducing the
smoothness of the fill, which improves the usability in slower
systems. |
| Background
generator timeout sets the time (in milliseconds) after which the execution
of a background generator will be aborted. MetaEdit+ uses generators extensively
to provide dynamic behavior (like conditional and template symbols elements, id
properties and Diagram Editor live check, etc.) and in some cases the generator
execution may slow down the overall performance (most background generators run
in under 1ms, but things like iterating through all graphs or using
representation information can take longer). We advise leaving the default value
(200ms) alone while building generators, but it can be increased or turned off
entirely with a value of 0 in order to make sure all background generators are
run to completion, e.g. during code
generation. |
Paths settings
The
Paths page (
Figure 3–16) lets you set the
directory for the databases roots file, server URL, choose to use an optional
external text editor and set the browser and directory information for help
files:
Figure 3–16. Options Tool: Paths page.
| 1) | If
your databases roots file artbase.roo
is in a directory other than the MetaEdit+ home directory, enter the new
location in the Roots File Dir field under
Repository Locations. The users of the multi-user version of MetaEdit+
should also ensure that the Server URL field carries the correct address
to their repository server. The proper server address should be obtained from
the person responsible for the MetaEdit+ server system administration in your
organization. For more information about the MetaEdit+ multi-user server, please
refer to ‘MetaEdit+ System Administrator’s
Guide’. |
| 2) | Enabling
the Use external Text Editor setting under Text Editor
allows you to use other Text Editors
than that built in to MetaEdit+. To set your editor preferences, enter the
command line for your editor in Editor command field (remember to include
%1 to represent the temporary file MetaEdit+ will create for your editor to work
with). The initial setting is a suggestion that will vary by platform.
|
| | By
pressing the Test button you may test your setting. If proper path and
program information is given the editor you specified should now open. If your
settings do not work, MetaEdit+ will open its built-in editor
instead. |
| | To
work properly with MetaEdit+, an external text editor should open a new window
each time the editor is called, and should not save backup copies of the edited
file (MetaEdit+ has no way of knowing about these, and hence could not delete
them). See the documentation that came with your text editor for whether it
already behaves correctly, or if there are options you can pass on the command
line to make it behave this
way. |
| | You
may test your text editor behavior by first opening the editor from outside
MetaEdit+, and then pressing the Test button. If a new instance of your
text editor starts, and when you close it there is no extra file left in your
system’s default temporary directory, your editor should work correctly.
Otherwise, please see the manuals of your text editor.
|
| 3) | The
switches in the Help Path section
let you define where the online HTML
manual is stored, and how it will be opened. You can define the browser
application that will be used for viewing the manual, the root path to the
manual directory, and various options for how these will be combined to form a
command string, which MetaEdit+ will send to be executed by your operating
system.
|
| | The
Browser path field can be left blank, in which case the HTML file itself
will be called. This works under Windows, but unfortunately Windows does not
support opening a given bookmark or point within a page in this way. Thus when
opening pages, the bookmark part, starting with a hash ‘#’, (e.g.
#Heading24) is stripped off by default: then the page opens, and you can select
the link to the correct subheading from the short table of contents at the top
of the page. By default, the hash part of the help link is removed if there is
no browser path specified. You can use the radio buttons to choose to always
remove the hash part, or always leave
it. |
| | To
allow opening of pages directly at the correct subheading, you must specify a
browser. In Windows, it is normally sufficient to specify simply
‘iexplore’ (Microsoft Internet Explorer) or ‘firefox’:
the full path is not normally
necessary. |
| | The
Manual root points to the location where your manuals are. It can be
either a URL or a directory (normally ‘manuals’ under your MetaEdit+
installation directory). Using this option you can move the manuals elsewhere,
for example to a shared location on a drive mounted from a server. By default
relative paths here will be expanded to full absolute paths if a browser path
has been given (this is because otherwise most browsers will search for the
manual page as if it were a WWW site, and fail to find it). You can also use the
radio buttons to choose to always expand relative paths for the manuals, or
never to expand
them. |
| | Some
operating systems require path names containing spaces or other special
characters to be enclosed in double quote marks. By default, in Windows the
browser path and manual path will be quoted in this way. You can use the radio
buttons to choose to always quote these two parts of the command, or not to
quote them. The latter is useful if you wish to add the quote marks yourself in
the browser command, to allow specification of other command line arguments for
your browser. |
Screen settings
The
Screen page (
Figure 3–17) of the Options tool
allows you to select the widget set look and feel
and
change the window background color
settings:
Figure 3–17. Options Tool: Color page.
Different
widget sets (Windows 7, Windows XP, Mac OS X Aqua, Motif, etc.) can be chosen
from the pull-down list at the top left corner of the page. Older platforms will
often not be able to supply correct color information for more modern widget
sets. Selecting Auto select will restore the standard setting.
To change the window background color (this can be useful
for distinguishing between multiple running instances of MetaEdit+) press the
Change... button on the right to open the color selection dialog (as
shown in
Figure 3–18):
Figure 3–18. Color selection tool.
Select the color
by picking it from the palette of predefined colors or mix you own with sliders
or by entering values in respective
HSV,
RBG or
HTML color
value fields. A preview – with comparison to the current color – is
shown on the left. If there is a need to reset the color to the system default,
press the
Reset button on the
Screen
page.
User settings
All user management tasks can be carried out from the
User
page (as shown in
Figure
3–19). Users are allowed to change their own user name, password and
fine tuning settings. A system administrator can also create or delete users and
grant or deny system administrator privileges for other users.
Figure 3–19. Options Tool: User page.
The User
Page shows a list of all users for the current repository. To change
settings for a specific user, choose the user account from the list and press
the right mouse button to get the pop-up menu for the list. The following
operations are available on the menu:
| 1) | Change
User Name... allows you to change the name of the
current
user. |
| 2) | Change
Password... allows you to change the password for the
current user. A password must be at least four characters and contain at least
one letter. Passwords are case
sensitive. |
| | Note
that changes in the user name and password must be saved to the repository
similarly to other information. Therefore, be sure that you press Commit
in the Launcher to save changes. If other users have changed their user names or
passwords at the same time, MetaEdit+ will inform you that it is not possible to
obtain a lock for user names or passwords. You should then wait until the lock
is available and
retry. |
| 3) | Fine
Tuning... allows you to optimize the performance of
memory management and repository operations. The predefined values are optimized
to give good performance over a wide range of use patterns and hardware /
software configurations, so normally you should not change these values. Fine
tuning is explained in more detail in the ‘MetaEdit+ System
Administrator’s Guide’. |
It is
also possible to create or delete users and grant or deny system administration
rights for users on the
User Page. These operations are explained in the
‘MetaEdit+ System Administrator’s Guide’ as they require
administrator privileges.
Repository settings
The
Repository page (
Figure 3–20) allows the user to view
settings concerning the repository. Many operations here are for system
administrators only, and should be used with care, and only after reading the
appropriate section of the ‘MetaEdit+ System Administrator’s
Guide’.
Figure 3–20. Options Tool: Repository page.
Check
Repository reports on types that may have incomplete
specifications, e.g. do not have an identifying property, symbol, etc. The
incomplete types are reported in a list dialog, from which they can be selected
for editing.
Metamodelers shows if the user has metamodeling
rights. The system administrator can specify which users have the right to
metamodel. This includes not only using the features of the Workbench version of
MetaEdit+ to create and modify types, but also the metamodeling features of the
standard version of MetaEdit+: changing symbols, property dialogs, and saving
generators.
The system administrator can also set the
Metamodel
security level. Exclusive means that the metamodeler must be the only user
in the repository, and single that there can be only one metamodeler in the
repository at a time, but any number of simultaneous non-metamodeling users. The
settings for the repository
are explained in more detail
in ‘MetaEdit+ System Administrator’s Guide’.
The
Repository Transcript
text box shows the log of the repository operations for the current session.
Please note that the transcript is not updated in real time, so to view possible
recent events, activate some other page in the Options Tool and then return to
the
Repository page.
File in Patches works similarly to the Import
button on the Main Launcher toolbar: see Section
5.3.2.
Reset Version History,
Garbage Collect,
Server..., and
Convert to Single are all
system administration operations and are explained in ‘MetaEdit+ System
Administrator’s
Guide’.
