Forms4.0: System editor support

From: Torsten Fassian <fassian_at_crpht.lu>
Date: 24 Jan 1994 13:22:46 GMT
Message-ID: <2i0i36$kml_at_caladan.restena.lu>

the following about the use of a
system editor in forms:

"2.11.3. System Editor Support

         Forms allows you to invoke your favorite text-based editor
         instead of the default one to edit multi-line textual
         information in the design and (optionally) in the runtime
         interface.

         The variable FORMS40_EDITOR is used to locate the user's         
preferred editor.  No editor will be launched unless this        

variable is
defined in the ORACLE.INI file.

         The editor should take, as a single argument on the


         "command-line", the filename of an ascii file.



         A temporary file will be created in the directory specified
         by the 'TMP' environment variable, or in the current
         directory if TMP is not set. The filename will be of the
         form "999.tmp"

         When exiting the editor, the file must be saved back as an


         "ASCII Only" file. No native word processor format is


         supported.

         Presently Forms can only call System Editor's which run in a
         single process. If you run an editor which, on startup,
         creates a separate process (Pearl Software's WinEmacs, for
         example) this will not work properly. "

As a consequence I added the following line to the oracle.ini file:

                FORMS40_EDITOR=c:\windows\notepad.exe

After that I launched the designer and edited a program unit. It was not the
notepad but still the default forms editor. Then I changed the 'Use system editor' preference to true and tried again. The result was the same.
There was not even an error message! After that I executed a form and edited a
field, the result was still the same (default runtime editor).

What did I do wrong? What's the use of the 'Use system editor' preference?

Many thanks!
Torsten Received on Mon Jan 24 1994 - 14:22:46 CET