Useful Tools

Several useful programming tools are a vailable to facilitate tasks common to system administrators, programmers, and general users. Y ou can reduce the tedious aspects of man y repetitious tasks b y using Hewlett-P ackard tools to expedite forms design, screen handling, report generation, and system dictionaries, as described belo w.

Forms Design and Screen Handling Tools

VPLUS/V is a comprehensiv e software system that implemen ts and controls source data entry. It also provides an interface between a terminal and an y transaction processing program.

Source Data Entry

As a source data en try system, VPLUS/V pro vides easy forms design with data editing and validation built in to the forms. It also pro vides a ready-to-use data en try program called ENTRY that you can use to enter data without an y programming e￿ort. ENTR Y allows you to browse the entered data and modify it as it is en tered.

Thus, source data en try through VPLUS/V can be done without programming b y simply using ENTRY. However, if you need additional or di￿eren t capabilities, y ou can write your own application incorporating VPLUS/V in trinsics.

Transaction Processing

As an interface to transaction processing applications, VPLUS/V pro vides a set of in trinsics that allows y ou to control forms and data on a terminal from an application program. These intrinsics are a vailable to programs written in an y of the supported programming languages.

VPLUS/V also pro vides a reformatting capabilit y. You can enter speci￿cations to con trol how entered data is to be reformatted and then run a program to actually reformat the data.

VPLUS/V intrinsics and the reformatting capability , either singly or in com bination, provide a \front end" to existing transaction processing applications. Th us, VPLUS/V allows y ou to concentrate on processing problems rather than on editing data or con trolling the terminal.

VPLUS/V Features

The main features of the VPLUS/V system are:

Forms design program called F ORMSPEC that allows quic k and easy forms design b y using menus at a terminal.

Batch mode managemen t of forms ￿les (through F ORMSPEC) that allows a forms ￿le to be updated, compiled, and listed without t ying up a terminal.

Advanced forms design (through F ORMSPEC) that edits, formats, mo ves, and computes data when the form is executed. It uses the user's nativ e language for alphabetic information and the local customs for n umeric and date information.

Ready-to-run data en try program called ENTR Y that provides immediate data en try and modi￿cation with no programming e￿ort.

Flexible data reformatting design program called REFSPEC that speci￿es reformatting of entered data.

Utilities and Tools 2-5