DIALOG(1)DIALOG(1)NAME
dialog - display dialog boxes from shell scripts
SYNOPSIS
dialog --clear
dialog --create-rc file
dialog [ --title title ] [ --clear ] box-options
DESCRIPTION
Dialog is a program that will let you to present a variety
of questions or display messages using dialog boxes from a
shell script. Currently, these types of dialog boxes are
implemented:
yes/no box, menu box, input box, message box, text box,
info box, and checklist box.
OPTIONS--clear
The screen will be cleared to the screen attribute
on exit.
--create-rc file
Since dialog supports run-time configuration, this
can be used to dump a sample configuration file to
the file specified by file.
--title title
Specifies a title string to be displayed at the top
of the dialog box.
Box Options
--yesno text height width
A yes/no dialog box of size height rows by width
columns will be displayed. The string specified by
text is displayed inside the dialog box. If this
string is too long to be fitted in one line, it
will be automatically divided into multiple lines
at appropriate places. The text string may also
contain the sub-string "\n" or newline characters
`\n' to control line breaking explicitly. This
dialog box is useful for asking questions that
require the user to answer either yes or no. The
dialog box has a Yes button and a No button, in
which the user can switch between by pressing the
TAB key.
--msgbox text height width
A message box is very similar to a yes/no box. The
only difference between a message box and a yes/no
box is that a message box has only a single OK but-
ton. You can use this dialog box to display any
message you like. After reading the message, the
user can press the ENTER key so that dialog will
exit and the calling shell script can continue its
operation.
--infobox text height width
An info box is basically a message box. However,
in this case, dialog will exit immediately after
displaying the message to the user. The screen is
not cleared when dialog exits, so that the message
will remain on the screen until the calling shell
script clears it later. This is useful when you
want to inform the user that some operations are
carrying on that may require some time to finish.
--inputbox text height width
An input box is useful when you want to ask ques-
tions that require the user to input a string as
the answer. When inputing the string, the BACKSPACE
key can be used to correct typing errors. If the
input string is longer than can be fitted in the
dialog box, the input field will be scrolled. On
exit, the input string will be printed on stderr.
--textbox file height width
A text box lets you display the contents of a text
file in a dialog box. It is like a simple text file
viewer. The user can move through the file by using
the UP/DOWN, PGUP/PGDN and HOME/END keys available
on most keyboards. If the lines are too long to be
displayed in the box, the LEFT/RIGHT keys can be
used to scroll the text region horizontally. For
more convenience, forward and backward searching
functions are also provided.
--menu text height width menu-height [ tag item ] ...
As its name suggests, a menu box is a dialog box
that can be used to present a list of choices in
the form of a menu for the user to choose. Each
menu entry consists of a tag string and an item
string. The tag gives the entry a name to distin-
guish it from the other entries in the menu. The
item is a short description of the option that the
entry represents. The user can move between the
menu entries by pressing the UP/DOWN keys, the
first letter of the tag as a hot-key, or the number
keys 1-9. There are menu-height entries displayed
in the menu at one time, but the menu will be
scrolled if there are more entries than that. When
dialog exits, the tag of the chosen menu entry will
be printed on stderr.
--checklist text height width list-height [ tag item sta-
tus ] ...
A checklist box is similar to a menu box in that
there are multiple entries presented in the form of
a menu. Instead of choosing one entry among the
entries, each entry can be turned on or off by the
user. The initial on/off state of each entry is
specified by status. On exit, a list of the tag
strings of those entries that are turned on will be
printed on stderr.
RUN-TIME CONFIGURATION
1. Create a sample configuration file by typing:
"dialog --create-rc <file>"
2. At start, dialog determines the settings to use as
follows:
a) if environment variable DIALOGRC is set, it's
value determines the name of the configuration
file.
b) if the file in (a) can't be found, use the file
$HOME/.dialogrc as the configuration file.
c) if the file in (b) can't be found, use compiled in
defaults.
3. Edit the sample configuration file and copy it to some
place that dialog can find, as stated in step 2 above.
ENVIROMENT
DIALOGRC Define this variable if you want to specify
the name of the configuration file to use.
FILES
$HOME/.dialogrc default configuration file
DIAGNOSTICS
Exit status is 0 if dialog is exited by pressing the Yes
or OK button, and 1 if the No or Cancel button is pressed.
Otherwise, if errors occur inside dialog or dialog is
exited by pressing the ESC key, the exit status is -1.
BUGS
Text files containing tab characters may cause problems
with text box. Tab characters in text files must first be
expanded to spaces before being displayed by text box.
Screen update is too slow.
AUTHOR
Savio Lam (lam836@cs.cuhk.hk)
10 January 1994 DIALOG(1)
