Chimera Command Usage Conventions

In the Usage sections of Chimera command manual pages:

• keywords to be taken literally are not italicized
• parameters that should be replaced with an appropriate value (such as a number or word) are italicized
• atom-spec refers to an atom specification string, which generally specifies “all” when left blank
• optional keywords and parameters are referred to as options or are enclosed in square brackets: [ ]
• mutually exclusive choices are separated by a vertical bar: |
• mutually exclusive choices of a required item are grouped with parentheses: ( )

All commands can be truncated to unique strings. Keyword truncation is not allowed unless a command's manual page states otherwise.

Multiple commands can be combined on a single line, separated by semicolons. This may be useful because the display is not redrawn until the last command in a semicolon-separated series has been executed; that is, multiple graphical changes such as changes in representation, color, and display state can be made to appear simultaneously instead of one by one.