General Methods

definition

Method to read a display definition, compare it with the idstring stored in the object (this is usually a file suffix) and return back an array of hashes containing all the relevant entries from the definition. If an argument is given, the object updates its definition of current idstring (and then searches).

   @defn = $display->definition;
   @defn = $display->definition($id);

An empty array is returned if the suffix can not be matched.

display_data

This is the main method to be used for displaying data. The supplied object must contain a method for determining the filename and the display ID (so that it can be compared with the information stored in the device definition file). It should support the file(), nfiles() and gui_id() methods.

The optional hash can be used to supply extra entries in the display definition file (or in fact do away with the definition file completely). Note that the contents of the options hash will be used even if no display definition can be found to match the current gui_id.

  $Display->display_data($Frm) if defined $Display;
  $Display->display_data($Frm, { TOOL => 'GAIA'});
  $Display->display_data($Frm, { TOOL => 'GAIA'}, $usedisp);

A third optional argument can be used in conjunction with the options hash to indicate whether these options should be used instead of the display definition file (false) or in addition to (true - the default)

parse_nbs_defn

Using the current idstring, read the relevant information from a noticeboard and return it in a hash. This routine takes no arguments (idstring is read from the object) and should only be used if the usenbs() flag is true.

  %defn = $self->parse_nbs_defn;

Currently not implemented.

parse_file_defn

Using the current idstring, read the relevant information from the text file (name stored in filename()) and return it in an array of hashes. There will be one hash per entry in the file that matches the given suffix. This routine takes no arguments (idstring is read from the object).

The input file is assumed to contain one line per ID of the following format:

  ID  key=value key=value key=value..........\n

append_monitor

Write information to a file that can be read by monitor processes. This allows the display system to be separated from the actual tools doing the displaying or for a clone display system to enable more than one person to view pipeline output.

  $display->append_monitor( $Frm, \%options, $usedisp );

Does nothing if this object is monitoring.

process_monitor_request

Given a line of text matching that written by the append_monitor method, trigger the display system accordingly by calling the display_data method.

  $Display->process_monitor_request( $line );

No-op if the Display is configured as a master.