Menubar

  The menubar consists of the following menu points:

Server

The Server menu contains all client server administration related functions as well as model and protocol related functions. It has the following submenus:

Connect CB Server ...

: Opens the registration window. It asks for the portnumber and the hostname of the desired server. If the button "Connect" is pressed ConceptBaseWorkbench tries to connect the application with the given server. The success or failure of this function is displayed in the Statusline (see Section 4.1.5).

Disconnect CB Server

: Ends the connection between the Server and the ConceptBase Workbench. You don't have to disconnect from the server normally as the ConceptBaseWorkbench disconnects automatically when it terminates.

Model

:

Load model ...

: Selects a *.sml file via a file-requesting dialogue and aks the server to load it as a model.

Save model ...

: Select a *.sml file as destination to store the frames of the instances of a given object.

Protocol

:

Load protocol ...

: Loads an ASCII file into the protocol.

Save protocol ...

: Saves the protocol as an ASCII file.

Report clients ...

: Lists the current users of the CBserver we are connected to.

Stop server

: Stops the CBserver, which is connected with the ConceptBaseWorkbench.

Quit

: Stops the ConceptBaseWorkbench and disconnects the server if necessary.

Edit

The Edit menu is divided into four different sections of submenus:

The first group of Edit functions addresses the usual clipboard actions:

Cut: Allows you to copy the range of text, which can be marked by holding the left mouse-button while moving the mouse over the text, into a buffer for further use. Any marked text will be removed from the Editor field after applying the Cut operation.

Copy: Does almost the same as Cut, only the marked range will remain inside the editor field.

Paste: Inserts the range of text, previously selected by Cut or Copy, at the position of the cursor into the text of the editor.

The second group of Edit functions supports server access:

Tell: The current text is communicated to the ConceptBase server, where an integration into the knowledge base is attempted. The success of this function is displayed in the Statusline (see Section 4.1.5)


Untell: The objects represented by the current text are `removed' from the knowledge base of the ConceptBase server and `entered' in the historical knowledge base.


Ask: The current text is interpreted as a query, which is answered by the ConceptBase server; the answer will be displayed in a specific answer window.

The current text is either the actually selected text or all contents of the editor (if nothing is selected). All server interaction but browsing can be done with these three functions. The contents of the Telos editor represents the frame(s) to Tell or Untell or the question to Ask. Then you invoke the appropriate function and the result will be written to the Telos editor. In the case of Tell and Untell you could read the success from the state of the completion symbol in the lower left corner. If the protocol field is visible, you will see both the question and the answer as separated regions. If you wish to change the answer format, you should use the menu item Options/Ask answerformat. For further help refer to the helptext of the options menu.

The third group of Edit functions consists of loading frames to the editor, calling a query by name and renaming object labels.

Call query: Calls a query by its name from within the Telos editor.


Load frame: Loads a given object in Telos frame representation into the Editor field. In the Interaction-window you have to enter the name of the object to be loaded. You should use this function if you want to edit an existing object or to generate a similar one.

Rename label: Rename the Object-label of an Individual object. Note! Please do not rename the label of any SystemClass objects ! This may cause severe malfunction of the ConcepBase Server. Furthermore, the textual representation of Rules and Constraints is not affected by this function (i.e. the old Object-labels will not be replaced in the assertion text) - though all Rules and Constraints will work with the new object labels.

The last group of the Edit menu allows a textual search of editor and protocol fields. Furthermore you can access the protocol as a ringbuffer for the Telos editor. The concept of regions is explained in Section 4.1.4.

Search
: Opens the search tool which provides a simple textual search in the editor window. The Search tool has the following fields:
Search
: enter the pattern where to look for
Cancel
: leaves the search tool.
Help
: Displays a short help information
Remark: If you press the Return-Key, all found positions are marked. The number of occurrences will be displayed in the statusline (see Section 4.1.5). The scope of the search tool comprises the Telos-editor and the protocol field. Especially the search within a protocol can be useful if you'd like to find any old information of the current session.

Clear Editor Buffer: Clears the buffer of the Telos editor.

Previous region: Copies the previous region from the protocol to the Telos editor.

Next region: Copies the next region from the protocol to the Telos editor.

Browsing

This sub-menu calls different browsing tools :

Display Instances

: You can choose a source class and the browser will display all its instances. You can iterate this process and finally copy the desired instance as Telos-frame to the Telos-editor. This tool is explained in Section 4.2.1.

Display Queries

: Lists all queries known to the ConceptBase server. You can copy a selected query as Telos-frame to the Telos-editor. Alternatively you can pick it to open the parameter mask of the query, from which the server could be asked with the specified parameters. See Section 4.2.2 for more information.

Browse Graphical

: Starts the external Graphbrowser. Refer to Section 4.2.3 for full information on the Graphbrowser Utility.

Options

The Options sub-menu supports the adjustment of different options:

Overwrite TelosEditor: If the Overwrite-item is checked the Telos editor will be cleared before a new server operation. Those transactions are a double-click in the protocol to copy the block or the activation of a button "Telos Editor" within the "display instance" or "display queries". If this item is not selected the new texts will appended into the Telos editor and the buffer becomes increases.

Rollbacktime ...: Starts a dialog for setting a rollbacktime that will be used for accessing the server. Please keep in mind that ConceptBase runs in Greenwich Mean Time(GMT), therefore you have to adjust the Rollbacktime to GMT. Note: this rollbacktime is not valid for the Graphbrowser Utility (see Section 4.2.3).
Ask answerformat: Choose between Telos, FRAGMENT and LABEL as the answerformat of all answers from the server to any queries.
Default connection ...: If the ConceptBaseWorkbench is frequently used while the CBserver is running on the same host with the same portnumber, then you could automate the connection by activating this option.
Display instances origin ...: Determines the default origin for the display instances dialog.
Graphical browser ...:
This submenu provides functions to adjust graphbrowser specific properties.

Origin ...

: Determines the default origin for the graphical browser startup dialog.

Palette ...

: Determines wether the GraphBrowser should run with a Color or Monochrome Palette.

Save options:
Saves altered options to the file ".CBworkbench.usr" in the HOME-directory of the user.

Help

The Helpmenu provides most of the information which was presented in this section on all available menus, the Editor field, the Protocol field and the status line. All dialogue Windows as well as the Browsing tools contain their own Help buttons too.