The IDE tabs on the Options dialog

These two tabs of the Options dialog allows setting values relevant to the IDE progamming environment.

On tab IDE 1

The Starting Up group: items in this group relate to how Lisp starts up. The items are:

• Initial Package: specifies the value returned by the default initial-package method.
• Use Single IDE Parent Window: specifies whether the use-ide-parent-window option is enabled. If checked, the IDE will use a single parent window that encloses all of its tool windows. If unchecked, it will instead use a single owner window that lets the various tool windows float freely on the screen. The unchecked option does not work well on X11 platforms. A change to this option will be in effect only when you restart the IDE (and a dialog will remind you of that).
• Start in Allegro Directory: specifies the default (checked is True, unchecked is nil) value returned by start-in-allegro-directory. Checking this box is usually only necessary if you start by double-clicking a dxl or exe file or by a custom Emacs command.
• Ask for Action at IDE Startup: if checked, the Startup Action dialog will appear when the IDE is started. This dialog asks whether to open a recently-used project, open some other project, create a new project, or proceed without a current project.

The Exiting group: items in this group relate to what Lisp does when you tell it to exit. The items are:

• Confirm Exit Request: if checked, an exit gesture (such as clicking on the Close box of the Project Window) will cause a dialog to be displayed asking if you really want to exit. See query-exit.
• Confirm OS Shutdown Request: if checked, an attempt to shut down the operating system will display an exit confirmation dialog even when there are no unsaved changes in the IDE. See query-os-exit.
• Save Options to User-Specific File: if checked, options are saved to a file specific to the current user rather than to the global prefs.cl file. See save-options-to-user-specific-file, where determining the name and path of the user-specific file is discussed.
• Save Options on Exit: if checked, options including such things as window location and size, are automatically saved to the file specific to the current user or to the global prefs.cl file on exit. See save-options-on-exit. Unclicking this (and applying) makes the current Lisp not save its options. In order to get the options file to specify that options should not be saved on exit, the current options with Save Options on Exit unclicked must be saved.

The History Lengths group: items in this group specify how much interaction history of various types should be stored. The items are:

• Recent Menus: the value, which should be a positive integer, specifies the maximum number of items that will be retained in each of the submenus of the Recent pull-down menu. See recent-limit.
• Listener: the value, which should be a positive integer, specifies the maximum number of recent evaluations that will be kept in the debug window's history list for possible re-evaluation later. See debug-history-limit.
• Clipboard: the value, which should be a positive integer, specifies the maximum number of cut or copied objects that the clipboard will hold. See clipboard-history-limit.

The Optional Dialogs group: items in this group specify whether modal dialogs (which require user action) should appear under certain conditions. These dialogs are enabled by default to provide helpful feedback, but once you are very familiar with the interface you may want to turn one or more of them off in order to work more quickly. The items are:

• Compiler Warnings Dialog: if checked, a dialog will appear if a warning is signaled during compilation. See show-dialog-on-compiler-warnings. (Warnings are always printed to the Debug Window.)
• Ask Before Auto-Saving: if checked, you are asked before files (such as project files) are saved automatically. See ask-before-auto-saving.
• Ask Before Assuming Package: if checked, you are asked before an IDE command will use a symbol in another package when the selected string does not name a symbol in the current package. See ask-before-assuming-package.
• Warn on No Action Taken: if checked, a dialog appears when an action is requested but cannot (for some reason) be performed. See warn-on-no-action-taken.

On tab IDE 2

The Miscellaneous group: items in this group concern various miscellaneous things which do not fit elsewhere. The items are:

• Show IDE Help Within the IDE: if checked, IDE help commands will display help in the IDE's own help window rather than in a third-party HTML browser. See use-cg-html-browser.
• Close Inactive Listeners: if checked, listener panes that become inactive will close automatically. See close-inactive-listeners.
• Symbol Completion in All Pkgs: if checked, a search for symbol completions will search all packages for possible completions if the specified package (when the partial symbol entered has a package qualifier) or the current package (when the partial symbol does not have a package qualifier) contains no possible completions. See symbol-completion-searches-all-packages.
• Context-Sensitive Default Path: if checked, affects the initial directory of file management dialogs displayed by Lisp. See context-sensitive-default-path for an explanation.
• Move Windows on Screen Resize: if checked, IDE windows will be automatically moved and resized when the screen size changes (if the IDE parent window is maximized). See move-ide-windows-on-screen-resize.
• Compile Files as UTF8: if checked, interactive compilation and loading commands will use the UTF8 external format, and otherwise will use the default external format (except when the commands are used in the editor, where the format is determined from the file contents and other IDE options). See compile-files-as-utf8.

The Status Bar Printing group: the items allow specification of the print level and print length in the main IDE status bar on the Project Window. The Project Window contains the IDE menus and toolbars along with the main IDE status bar. The items are:

• Lisp-Message Print Level: the value of *print-level* when printing status bar messages. See lisp-message-print-level.
• Lisp-Message Print Length: the value of *print-length* when printing status bar messages. See lisp-message-print-length.

The multi-item list shows the various possible toolbar icons either selected or not (all the illustrated ones are selected; you would have to scroll down to see unselected ones). All unselected icons are on the Extended Toolbar, displayed (as a floating palette) by the View | Extended Toolbar command. If you change which icons are selected and apply the changes, the toolbars are redisplayed according to your choices. A gap is the vertical line dividing groups of toolbar icons.

The Backtrace Printing group: items in this group control the printing of backtraces in the Debug window after an error. The items are:

• Backtrace-Print-Circle: the value of *print-circle* in a backtrace. See backtrace-print-circle.
• Backtrace-Print-Level: the value of *print-level* in a backtrace. See backtrace-print-level.
• Backtrace-Print-Length: the value of *print-length* in a backtrace. See backtrace-print-length.

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This page was not revised from the 8.2 page.
Created 2012.5.30.