Copyright © Cloud Software Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Adding Help Information

Overview of Help

TIBCO Object Service Broker provides users with three levels of help: field, screen, and general. In the Screen Definer, via a PF key, you can add the following help to the screen while you are defining it:

•

Screen

•

Field

Adding Screen Help

Screen help provides information on the tool. It is accessed when the cursor is not placed on a field or by pressing PF1 again after accessing field help.

To add screen help, complete the following tasks:

1.	From the Screen Definer screen, press PF19.

A screen for text editing appears.

2.	Add or modify screen help.

You can use the TIBCO Object Service Broker SCRIPT tool and the TEXTSETUP HELP to format the help.

3.	Press PF5 to script the help text.

This displays the formatted text users see when they press PF1 from the displayed screen.

Toggle back and forth to edit and view.

Examples of Screen Help

The following two examples illustrate the unformatted Screen Help screen and then the corresponding formatted text similar to what users see when they use PF1.

Unformatted Screen Help

The following example illustrates unformatted screen help:

---

 

Enter HELP text for screen EMPLOYEE_EXPENSE

_ ----------------------------------------------------------------------------

_ .setup help

_ .p.This screen is used to enter monthly employee expense data.

_ You can use the following PF keys:

_ .table FCNKEYS(employee_expense), pf_key, name, description

PFKEYS: 12=QUIT 13=PRINT 3=SAVE 5=SCRIPT

---

 

Formatted Screen Help

The following example illustrates formatted screen help similar to what users see when they use PF1.

---

 

Formatted Output Scroll: P

This screen is used to enter monthly employee expense data. You can use

the following PF keys:

PF_KEY NAME DESCRIPTION

----- ---------------- ----------------------------------------

PF12 EXIT EXIT

PF13 PRINT PRINT

PF3 SAVE SAVE

PF9 TOTAL TOTAL

PFKEYS: 12=QUIT 13=PRINT 3=SAVE 5=EDIT

---

 

Adding Field Help

Field help is information about the field where the cursor is currently located.

To add field help, complete the following tasks from the Screen Table Painter:

1.	Position the cursor on the field to which you want to add help.

2.	Press PF19.

A screen for text editing appears.

3.	Add or modify field help.

You can use the TIBCO Object Service Broker SCRIPT tool and the TEXTSETUP HELP to format the help.

4.	Press PF5 to script the help text.

This displays the formatted text as it appears to users when they press PF1 from the displayed screen.

Toggle back and forth to edit and view.

Examples of Field Help

The following are examples of an unformatted Field Help screen and then the corresponding formatted help similar to what users see when they press PF1.

Unformatted Field Help

The following example illustrates unformatted field help:

---

 

Enter HELP text for field MONTH

_ ----------------------------------------------------------------------------

_ .setup help

_ .p.Enter the date in the format of MMM YYYY.

PFKEYS: 12=QUIT 13=PRINT 3=SAVE 5=SCRIPT

---

 

Formatted Field Help

The following example illustrates formatted field help similar to what users see when they press PF1:

---

 

Formatted Output Scroll: P

Enter the date in the format of MMM YYYY.

PFKEYS: 12=QUIT 13=PRINT 3=SAVE 5=EDIT

---

 

Field help appears on the same screen as the prompt options. Every time PF1 is pressed a list of options for that field appears. You can use this feature to provide instructions or explanations of options for prompt fields.

Example

The following is an example of field-level help (containing user prompting) for the TYP field of the Table Definer:

---

 

----------------------------- FIELD Level Help --------------------------

COMMAND ==> Scroll:

TYP (Mandatory): Enter the semantic data type of the field you are creating.

The semantic type determines how the data can be used. The use of this field

ensures that the named field will contain data only of the kind for which it

was intended. The default is null.

TYPE_CHAR TYPE_NAME

_ C Count

_ D Date

_ I Identifier

_ L Logical

_ Q Quantity

_ S String

S=Select

PFKEYS: 3=RETURN VALUE 12=CANCEL

---

 

See Also

TIBCO Object Service Broker Shareable Tools for more information on the tools.

Copyright © Cloud Software Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved