ProBoard BBS Documentation

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Creating Menus │ └───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Your BBS's main menu MUST! be stored in a file called TOP.PBM. All the other menus can have any file name you want to give them.

When you select the 'Menu Editor' option in PROCFG's main menu, a new window will be opened containing the menus already available (if any).

In this window, you can use the following keys:

1. Up/Down Scroll up/down.
2. Enter Select a menu.
3. Ins Add a menu.

When you have selected a menu, a list of all the menu items will be displayed. To add a menu item, just move past the last item and press <Enter>. To insert an item, press <Ins>, to remove one, press <Del>. To edit a menu item, move the selector to that item and press <Enter>. You can change the menu prompt and highlight colors by pressing <Alt-P>. If you want to see how a menu will look, press <Alt-S> to simulate what your users will see when they view this menu.

You can also copy and paste menu items.

To copy an item, move to the item you want to copy, and press <Alt-C>. To insert the copied item somewhere else, move to the place where you want

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the menu item inserted, and press <Ctrl-P>. You can even copy and paste items across different menus.

A menu item has the following fields: ─────────────────────────────────────

Textline………………… This is the string to be displayed.

                            Leaving this field blank causes a blank
                            line to be displayed to the user. A CR/LF
                            will be sent after the menu line. To avoid
                            this, just enter a ';' as the last
                            character.  This will cause the next
                            textline of the menu to be appended to this
                            one.

                            Special textline characters:

                               ^ : Switches between normal and
                                   highlighted color.
                               ~ : Replaced by the number of minutes
                                   the user has left in this session.
                               ` : Replaced by the name of the current
                                   message area (more about this
                                   later).
                               @ : Replaced by the name of the
                                   current file area (more about this
                                   later).

                            This textline can also contain text macros
                            like @<NAME>@ or @<NODE>@.  More about

                            this in the "Text macros" section.

                            You are not limited to two colors in menu
                            lines. You can use the codes \1 to \7 to
                            change colors, or \0 to return to the
                            original color.

Hotkey………………….. Most of the menu functions must be chosen

                            by the user, so ProBoard must react to
                            certain key-presses from the user.
                            Receiving the hotkey for a certain menu
                            item will cause ProBoard to execute the
                            function associated with this item.  The
                            hotkey can be any ASCII character or
                            digit, but one character has a special
                            meaning to ProBoard: <Ctrl-A> will make
                            this function AUTOEXEC, which means that
                            this function will be executed as soon as
                            this menu item is displayed (without
                            really selecting this option).

Function………………… The function associated with this menu

                            item. Pressing the <Enter> key will cause
                            a complete list of all the menu functions
                            to be displayed in a separate window.

Data……………………. This field is optional with some of the

                            functions. Basically, in this field you
                            enter the parameters of a menu function.
                            Eg. function 40 (Display ASC/ANS file)

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                            needs a filename as data (parameter).
                            Function 1 (Goto menu) needs the name of
                            the menu to be jumped to. Text macros can
                            be inserted (see "Text macros" section).

Level…………………… Level needed to access this menu item.

Flags…………………… Flags needed to access this menu item.

Color…………………… Color for the menu's textline to be

                            displayed in.