II. STARGRASP Software Command Syntax Notes

A command and argument=value syntax is used throughout the layers of STARGRASP software. This applies to the demo scripts (written in Bourne Shell), the toolkit level commands which can be executed on a "command line" or from your favorite scripting language, and the ASCII socket level interface implemented on the controller. (It does not apply to the C API where the interface is a standard C-Language function call interface.) The following general rules apply:

• Arguments always follow the command.
• Order is not important(*)
• Do not include dashes "-" or "--" in front of the argument.
• Do not include white space around the equal sign ("=")
• Enclose white space in a value with double quotes (or quotes appropriate for the scripting language you are using.)

Examples:

go nexp=3 etype=DARK comment="Some comment string w/ spaces"  GOOD
go 3                                                          Not recommended
go nexp = 3                                                   WRONG
go nexp=3 etype=DARK comment=Some comment string              WRONG

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(*) The only time order is important is when using a shorthand in which only the value is given (i.e., no argument and no =). In this case, the command parser falls back on positional rules. This syntax is not recommended, because the full syntax is more explicit, provides a level of self-documentation in scripts, and is easier to make sense of in network traces.