Command: applications

Syntax

applications

Description

Display the applications menu.

Parameters

None

Switches

• -ic
  Open the menu box iconic, or iconize the menu box if it is already open.

• -inv
  Hide the applications menu, i.e. make it invisible. If this switch is not present the menu will be made visible.

• -pos=<screen_xy>
  X,Y screen position for the menu. The default is 0,0.

• -tb
  Display the window menu icon in the Windows taskbar. The default behavior is not to display it in the taskbar but only to display it on the desktop when minimized. This switch has no meaning on Unix systems.

Notes

The applications menu displays the names of all application libraries currently available to the system. By toggling the indicator button to the left of an application name the corresponding application is started/stopped. If an application has a supplementary macro, an arrow button is displayed to the right of the name.

Details of which application libraries are present in the menu are given in the file mxapps.def, which should reside in the $HOME or $MXSITE directories. The format of entries in this file is as follows:

<library> { <text> }

where:

• <library>
  An application library file created by the applib utility.

• <text>
  An optional description to appear in the applications menu box.

If <text> is omitted, the description within <library> is used.

Starting/stopping an application is equivalent to executing the command:

start @<app> or stop @<app>

where:

• <app> is the application name contained within <library>.

The supplementary macro should have the name @<app>/button.cmd and is executed when the arrow button is pressed.

Once displayed, the applications menu cannot be removed. At system startup, the applications menu is positioned at the top left of the display. If the applications menu is already present, use of this command with the -pos and/or -ic will merely change its position or iconic state.

Examples

Display the applications menu box.

applications

Display the applications menu box at a position indicated with the mouse.

applications -pos=scur

See Also