xref: /plan9/usr/glenda/readme.rio (revision 9a747e4fd48b9f4522c70c07e8f882a15030f964)
1Rio is the Plan 9 window system.
2
3To read more of this window, the up and down arrows
4scroll the text up and down half screens.
5
6To effectively use rio, you need at least a three
7button mouse.  If you only have a two button mouse you
8can emulate the middle button by holding down shift key
9whilst pressing the right button.
10
11Button 1, 2, and 3 are used to refer to the left,
12middle, and right buttons respectively.
13
14THE POP-UP MENU
15
16Pressing and holding down button 3 on the desktop or
17shell window will give you a menu with the following
18options:
19
20 * New - create a new window
21 * Resize - reshape a window
22 * Move - move a window without reshaping it
23 * Delete - close a window
24 * Hide - hides a window from display (it will appear
25   in this menu)
26 * <label> - the label of a hidden window,
27   selecting it unhides it
28
29You select an item by releasing the button over the
30menu item.  rio uses the same button that started an
31action throughout that operation.  If you press another
32button during the action the operation is aborted and
33any intermediate changes are reversed.
34
35The menu acts as a action verb selector which then
36requires an object (i.e.  window) to be picked to
37indicate which window the verb is to act on.  A further
38mouse action may then be required.
39
40EXAMPLES
41
42After selecting New, the cursor will change into a
43cross.  Using button 3 again, you should then drag out
44a rectangle to indicate the size and location of the
45new window.  When you release the button a new window
46will be created.
47
48New windows will contain the rc shell.  Invoking a rio
49program from the shell will allow that program to take
50over the window.  As there is no job control in the
51shell (e.g.  &, fg, bg), you just create another window
52if you want to run another program concurrently.
53
54To Resize a window, you select Resize, then click
55(remember using the same button that started the
56action, i.e.  button 3) on the window you want to
57resize.  The cursor will change to a cross-hair theat
58will allow you to drag out the desired shape of the
59window.
60
61After selecting Move, click and keep the button
62depressed over the window you want to move, then move
63the mouse to move the red rectangle that represents the
64new location you want.  Release the button to finish
65the action.
66
67Delete and Hide both operate by requiring you to click
68on the window you wish to respectively Delete or Hide.
69
70WINDOW CONTROL TIPS
71
72Clicking on a window brings it to the front.
73
74You can directly change the shape of a window by
75clicking and dragging on the edge or corner of the
76window border.  Button 1 or 2 will allow you to drag
77the edge or corner to a new size, and Button 3 will
78allow you to move the window.
79
80The pop-up menu remembers the last command chosen, so
81as a short cut you can just press and release button 3
82without moving the mouse between pressing and releasing
83to select the previous command again.
84
85BASIC TEXT CONTROL
86
87Unlike in other systems, the text cursor can only be
88controlled by the mouse or the side-effects of certain
89commands.
90
91Clicking with button 1 will move the text insertion
92point (indicated by an I-beam) to just before the
93character closest to the mouse pointer.  Dragging
94across a section of text will select that portion of
95text.  It may be useful to know that the insertion
96I-beam represents an empty selection (between two
97characters).  In text editors, the current selection is
98known as "dot".
99
100In the shell window button 2 will invoke a pop-up menu.
101Most of it's commands operate on dot.
102
103 * cut - moves the contents of the dot to the clipboard
104   if dot is non-empty
105 * paste - replaces dot with the contents of the clipboard
106 * snarf - copies dot to the clipboard
107 * plumb - sends dot (or text surrounding dot, if dot is
108   empty)to the plumber.
109 * send - completes the current input line with the dot,
110   if it is non-empty, or the contents of the clipboard.
111   If the dot is non-empty it does a snarf at the same time.
112 * scroll - toggles the automatic scrolling of the window
113   on output.
114
115Double-clicking will allow you to automatically select
116a section of text surrounding that point.  The
117selection is made by an analysis of appropriate
118delimeters.  A whole line is selected by
119double-clicking at either end of the line.  A quoted or
120bracketed selection is made by double-clicking just
121inside of the quote or bracket.
122
123SCROLLING
124
125The arrow keys will let you scroll up or down by half a
126page at a time.
127
128Clicking button 1 on the scrollbar scrolls up by half a
129page.  Button 3 scrolls down by half a page.  Button 2
130jumps to position in the document relative to the
131position on the scrollbar clicked.  Holding a button on
132the scrollbar will have the effect of invoking the
133clicking action continuously.
134
135The white elevator box on the scrollbar is sized
136proportionally to the proportion of the document that
137is currently visible.
138
139Scrolling does not affect the text cursor.
140
141RIO AND THE RC SHELL WINDOW
142
143Rc is a command interpreter for Plan 9 that provides
144similar facilities to UNIX's Bourne shell.  See the
145additional references at the end of this document for
146information specifically about rc.
147
148Rio provides some additional features that enhance the
149interface to programs that use the text console.  The
150rc shell command interpreter is one such program.
151
152Rc commands are typed after the prompt on the last line
153of the text buffer.  The commands are sent to rc only
154after each newline so line editing may be performed if
155desired.  You can move the cursor and edit the previous
156lines of commands and program output but none of this
157will be interpreted by rc shell.
158
159The interpretation of commands is supressed altogether
160when ESC is pressed to put the window in hold mode.
161The window border and text will change to dark blue to
162indicate the hold mode is active.  In this mode you can
163type multiple lines of commands and edit them.
164Pressing ESC again will release the hold and send the
165lines of text to the rc command interpreter.
166
167The DEL key sends an 'interrupt' note to all processes
168in the window's process group.  The usual intent is to
169terminate the execution of the current command.  It is
170also a convenient short cut for ensuring you have a
171fresh command prompt.
172
173FURTHER INFORMATION
174
175For further information, try the rio(1) manual page.
176Type "man rio" or click on rio(1) in either of these
177sentences and select plumb from the button 2 menu.
178
179