Menu bar

The VisualAge Pacbase administrator Workbench menu bar is shown in Figure 4-63.

Figure 4-64 The administrator Workbench menu bar

File options

When you use the VisualAge Pacbase administrator Workbench, you are using a local copy (workspace) of the VisualAge Pacbase administration database from the server. The menu bar file option allows you to do the following regarding this local copy:

򐂰 Save workspace locally.

򐂰 Save workspace as ...

The File option lets you manage your connection to the server as well. Normally, as the VisualAge Pacbase administrator, you will be connected to the VisualAge Pacbase repository server. Your changes will be made using a local copy of the repository which will be synchronized with the server repository. It is possible to disconnect from the server and work only with your local copy of the repository. To do this, you would select Disconnect from the File menu. If you need to use the server copy again (for example, to resynchronize your changes) you would use the File menu to Reconnect.

VisualAge Pacbase allows you to customize the look and feel of your

administrator Workbench using Preferences from the file menu. The changes made using Preferences affect this Workbench only, they are not global to VisualAge Pacbase. A dialog box will appear that identifies the types of preferences that you can set. These include:

򐂰 General preferences for pane behavior, which allow you to: – Show or hide title bars

– Highlight a selected pane

– Specify the size of the pane history cache

– Appearance, which allows you to change the colors and borders associated with displayed information and also change the fonts for the Workbench display

– Toolbars, which provides options to reposition toolbars and control their behavior

– Help, which specifies the browser to be used to display help information and the location of the browser program

򐂰 Workspace preferences allow you to manage the local workspace for the VisualAge Pacbase administrator Workbench. Using these options, you can: – Specify the workspace root directory

– Indicate that the workspace is saved whenever VisualAge Pacbase is closed

– Indicate that the saved workspace is loaded when the VisualAge Pacbase administrator Workbench is restarted.

– Completely discard the content of the local workspace using the clear workspace button

Tab options

The administrator Workbench manages seven things relative to site administration: 򐂰 Databases 򐂰 Command lines 򐂰 Profiles 򐂰 Pac/Transfer 򐂰 Users 򐂰 Security 򐂰 Parameters

These are managed through the use of tabs except for Security and Parameters, which are managed from the menu bar. Figure 4-65 shows the tabs for the VisualAge Pacbase Workbench.

Figure 4-65 Tabs for the VisualAge Pacbase administrator Workbench

The second position from the left in the menu bar changes to correspond to the tab selected. For the tab selected, the menu bar will provide options to:

򐂰 Create a new occurrence of the entity managed by the selected tab (for example, in the preceding figure the tab selected manages databases)

򐂰 Sort the list displayed by the tab in either ascending or descending sequence based on a property of the displayed information

Menu bar choices are also available in the form of a pop-up context menu by right-clicking.

Window options

The Window options on the menu bar control the appearance of the Workbench display. Using the Window options, you can:

򐂰 Maximize, minimize and restore the pane.

򐂰 Lock the window so it cannot be closed.

򐂰 Open the Workbench and Workspace manager and switch between them. The tab display is divided into two parts, selection and definition. The selection pane displays a list of the user entities being managed and the definition pane displays the properties for that type of user entity. The Window options allow you to determine whether either or both panes are displayed.

Security and Parameters are managed through the Window options. You can open either the Security browser or the Parameters browser.

Security browser

The Security browser consists of three tabs, as shown in Figure 4-66.

The definition tab of the Security browser lets you indicate to VisualAge Pacbase if your organization already uses a security tool such as RACF (Resource Access Control Facility). Other options are activated depending on the security tool indicated.

You can specify these Password options using the definition tab as well:

򐂰 The number of old passwords managed

򐂰 The number of days that a password will be considered valid

򐂰 The minimum number of characters that the password must contain

򐂰 Whether the user can specify a blank password

򐂰 Whether the password must contain numeric characters

򐂰 Whether the password can be the same as the user id

The tab identified as VA Pac Access Key allows the VisualAge Pacbase

administrator to maintain the key for the product. The key controls which options are licensed for VisualAge Pacbase and also controls access to the repository. The key is established when VisualAge Pacbase is installed and is maintained whenever the organization renews its product license or purchases additional product options.

If the organization has purchased the DSMS (Development Support

Management System) option, then the DSMS Control tab is used to maintain information for use of that product option.

Parameters browser

Figure 4-67 The VisualAge Pacbase Parameters browser

VisualAge Pacbase allows the administrator to set parameters related to the use of special characters, error messages, and the categorization of the text

documentation entity. Normally, the special characters feature is not used. When applications are generated from the VisualAge Pacbase, error handling is supplied as part of the generated application. Specific error messages are generated into a file which is then used to retrieve and display the appropriate error message. The text for these error messages is standard but can be overridden through the Parameters browser using the Error labels tab.

The original text is displayed, and the administrator can type in new text for the error message, as shown in Figure 4-68.

Figure 4-68 Changing the error message text using the parameters browser

The Text labels tab refers to the entity used in previous versions of VisualAge Pacbase to produce documentation and assign that documentation to other entities within the Pacbase repository. This entity is the Text entity and it consists of a definition and sections (also called paragraphs).

VisualAge Pacbase allows the text entity to be assigned to a category through the use of a two character code. In the same manner, the sections of the text can be categorized by two-character codes.

The meaning of these two-character codes is documented using the Text labels tab of the Parameters browser as shown in Figure 4-69. This facility is for upward compatibility purposes only. The text entity has been replaced by the publishing facility, discussed later in this redbook.

Figure 4-69 Documenting text pages

Selected

The Selected option from the menu bar becomes active when an entity is selected using one of the tabs on the VisualAge Pacbase administrator Workbench. All of the options pertain to the selected entity and include:

򐂰 Open, which allows you to see the information for the selected entity

򐂰 Copy, which allows you to copy a portion of the entity

򐂰 Duplicate, which allows you to copy the complete entity

򐂰 Refresh, which updates the displayed information

򐂰 Discard Changes, which allows you to restore the entity

򐂰 Delete, which allows you to remove the entity

򐂰 Save, which commits your changes for the entity

򐂰 Create, which allows you to create a new occurrence of the entity

򐂰 Sort, which displays a list of properties for the entity for the purpose of placing the list of entities for the tab in ascending or descending sequence

These options are context sensitive and vary from one instance to another, some options being grayed out. These options are also accessible by right-clicking an entry in the displayed list.

Workspace

The Workspace option from the menu bar is used to resynchronize your local version of the repository with the server repository. This action applies changes that you have made to the entities in your local repository to the corresponding entities in the server repository.

Help

The Help option of the VisualAge Pacbase administrator Workbench menu bar contains the following:

򐂰 Help Home Page

򐂰 Workbench Home

򐂰 Support

򐂰 About Workbench

The first three options invoke the browser to display related help information for the VisualAge Pacbase user.