Re: WDSCI-L Digest, Vol 14, Issue 305

"WDSCI-L" <wdsci-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote on 07/02/2016 01:00:02 PM:

----- Message from Buck Calabro <kc2hiz@xxxxxxxxx> on Fri, 1 Jul
2016 13:54:47 -0400 -----

To:

wdsci-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx

Subject:

Re: [WDSCI-L] Member filter issue...

On 7/1/2016 12:55 PM, CRPence wrote:

On 01-Jul-2016 10:08 -0500, Brian Johnson wrote:

Mouse or not... fabulous prize will be awarded (not!) for a filter
that selects members with member text that contains an asterisk.

Search the help text or docs for, if there exists support for, an
/escape/ character in that context.

Perfectly sensible advice. Here's what F1 tells me:
'Use this dialog to change your filter. Filters can contain one or more
filter strings. In the Remote Systems view, when a filter is expanded,
the results of resolving all the strings are concatenated together. Use
this dialog to add additional strings, and to order, delete or change
the strings. Use the context menu on a string for additional actions.'

Some nomenclature explanation might help.
On the left are a list of named 'things' called 'Filter strings'. Each
of these named objects contains an assortment of search / filter
criteria. In order, these are:

Library
File
Member filter
Member text

The behaviour for the top two (Library and File) are close to what IBM i
programmers expect of IBM i commands accepting generic names. Filtering
on Library QGPL, File Q* would return all the files beginning with Q in
library QGPL.

The member filter behaves a bit differently. It takes a pattern
somewhat reminiscent of OPNQRYF. Let's say that my chosen source file
has members named EXAMPLE1 through EXAMPLE38 as well as one member named
EXPAT_H, one named HTTPXMLR4, and one named XMLSTUBR4. I could filter
for all the members beginning with EX by putting EX* in the Member
filter. I could filter for all the members containing an X somewhere in
their name by using *X*. I could find all the members ending with a 3
by using *3.

The Member text behaves different to the prior two. It does an implicit
wildcard search. So putting in EX gives me all the EXAMPLE members as
well as the EXPAT_H member. There are two special values allowed: *
(for don't restrict the search) and *BLANK, which returns a list of
members not having text specified.

The documentation is... a work in progress. The support portal has
links to Rational Developer for i documentation, but of course the
resolved page is the AIX / Linux version. I'm sure Developerworks have
a working link but finding the right place in DW takes more cognitive
energy than I have to spare at the moment. Oh, and the help within the
product throws an HTTP 500 error. A reboot of my PC will probably cure
that but I can't really send my time down that rabbit hole. It's a
little crazy when it takes longer to restart my PC than to restart the
IBM i operating system, but it looks I've reached the pinnacle of my
career.

So once again, everything I think I know comes from empirical evidence;
actually trying it out.

I can relate to the challenges of restarting your PC. Mine too, gets
longer and longer--at times I get a nice blue banner across the screen
telling me the system is going to reboot in one minute. So I have no
choice but to try to close all my open documents and applications within a
minute--and then go get a cup of coffee or something whilst I wait for the
reboot to finish.

Anyway, the filtering works pretty much the same as the subset criteria in
PDM. You can use generic searches for an object, a member type, a member
name, etc. But the member or object text is and has always been a wildcard
search. I'm sure the decision was made somewhere to have it mimic PDM.

I've not had so many challenges with the documentation. But just to make
things fun, I can no longer sign into IBM developerWorks. I run Firefox
with noscript, but even doing a 'Temporarily allow all this page' doesn't
work (even after seven layers deep of temporarily allow--the cloud is
crazy). I really don't understand why IBM thinks they need to have all the
ad serving junk on developerWorks anyway. This is a real bummer.

So much for RFEs etc. I'll try sending an e-mail off their Contact page.
We'll see how that goes.

Michael Quigley
Computer Services
The Way International
www.TheWay.org