[Chimera-users] [chimera-dev] alias menu

[Eric Pettersen]

On Feb 4, 2009, at 5:09 AM, Richmond Timothy J. wrote:

> Dear Chimera Developers,
>
> Perhaps I have missed it, but I would find a menu for selected  
> aliases very useful. Having returned to Chimera from PyMol recently,  
> it would be great to have an option for the alias command that  
> allowed the particular alias to be listed in a separate window and  
> ran the alias by clicking on the alias name listed there.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Tim

Hi Tim,
	As Elaine pointed out in her reply, aliases are frequently used as  
shorthands for long atom specs rather than as replacements for  
complete commands.  However, the form of the alias command that uses  
'^' (so that matching only occurs at the start of the line) typically  
is used to define full command aliases.

	So my thinking is this: aliases defined with the '^' character would  
be placed in an 'Aliases' top-level menu (created on the fly as  
needed).  Such aliases would automatically be remembered across  
Chimera invocations (and populate an Aliases menu).  The menu could be  
torn-off (except on Aqua) to make a stand-alone window.  Those aliases  
could be deleted as normal with the ~alias command (which would remove  
them from the menu and no longer remember then in subsequent Chimeras).

	Would this be good enough?

--Eric

                         Eric Pettersen
                         UCSF Computer Graphics Lab
                         http://www.cgl.ucsf.edu


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