Making notes (NOTES)

Introduction.

One of the problems one encounters when sitting in front of the graphics screen is that the amount of information obtainable is larger than the mind can grasp in the short time of one session. WHAT IF therefore allows for several ways of making notes. All these notes can be printed during or after the session.

This chapter describes the ways in which you can make notes. There are two kinds of notes: Notes per residue and overall notes.

The chapter on DOLOG and NOLOG describes a way to get a direct copy of all output send to the terminal also in a printable file.

General notes

WHAT IF allows you to log your bright ideas and new insights without the use of paper and pencil. Besides one notebook per residue, there is the possibility to keep an infinite number of general notebooks (or just one of course).

Be aware that once you have asked for a notebook, this notebook will stay the default notebook, until you change its name.

Be aware that notebooks are nothing more than formatted files on disk, and thus accessible to you using a normal text editor.

Create a, new, general notebook (MAKNEW)

The command MAKNEW will prompt you for the name of a new note book. It will then generate this notebook, and it will open it. If you give the name of an existing notebook this book will be read to you, and without further notice the old notebook is overwritten with an empty new one.

Open an old general notebook (USEOLD)

The USEOLD command will open an existing notebook for you. You will be prompted for the name of the notebook. Subsequent WRITE commands will allow you to write in this notebook. The notebook stays open for writing till you change to another notebook (via MAKNEW, or another USEOLD command), or till you explicitly close it with the CLOSE command.

Close the general notebook (CLOSE)

CLOSE explicitly closes the presently open notebook. If there is no open notebook a warning is given. This option might be nice if you want to edit your notebook with a text editor. Otherwise there is no real need for this option because WHAT IF itself knows when the notebook has to be closed.

Display contents of general notebook (PRINT)

The command PRINT lists the entire contents of the default notebook. A warning is given if there is no default notebook yet. You get a default notebook by using either USEOLD, or MAKNEW.

Write a note in the general notebook (WRITE)

The WRITE command writes a note at the end of the present default notebook. If you do not have a default notebook yet, you must first get one by using MAKNEW or USEOLD. WRITE will prompt you for lines of text. You can type whatever normal text you want, but don't use control or escape sequences. Lines should not be longer than 79 characters. You should end this note by typing a zero.

The notebook will stay open for writing till you explicitly close it with the command CLOSE.

Index the notebook (NINDEX)

If you twist my arm far enough, I will start writing the NINDEX option that is supposed to give you an index of the general notebook, sorted by date, topic, keyword, etc.

Notes per residue

WHAT IF keeps one notebook per residue. These notebooks are kept as files with the name AAN***.NOT (*** is the number of the residue) in your directory.

Adding a note for a residue (AANOTE)

When you use the command AANOTE you will be prompted for the residue for which you want to write a note. If you have never use the notebook for this residue yet, WHAT IF will generate it.

Regardless whether this is a new or an existing notebook, you will be prompted for your notes. You can type whatever you want, but not more than 79 characters per line. To stop writing notes you should give a zero.

Don't use escape or control characters in the text for notes.

Display the notebook for one residue (AASHOW)

If you want to read previously written notes you can use the command AASHOW. You will be prompted for a residue. Don't worry if you forgot whether you already made note for a certain residue or not, WHAT IF remembered that for you, and will simply warn you if there are no notes.

You can not crash WHAT IF by making mistakes like asking for notes that are not there (yet).

Initialize a notebook for a residue (AANEW)

Sometimes you might want to restart writing notes about an residue. The easiest way of doing so is to use the editor and remove the lines from the residue notebook file which you do not like. (Inserting lines is also allowed, as long as you stick to normal text lines of maximally 79 characters and don't use control or escape sequences).

The oiption AANEW will cause WHAT IF to prompt you for a residue number. It will then list all notes that were present in the old notebook for this residue. Without any further warnings or messages the notebook is overwritten with an empty notebook.