Installation of SWI-Prolog-Editor

After the download of the SWI-Prolog-Editor you unzip the files into a temporary folder und execute the
setup.exe program.

The installation-program has special support for school-situations. It is possible to install the SWI-Prolog-
Editor local or on a server. You can choose the folder for installation

At the end of installation you execute SWI-Prolog-Editor to initialize the registry or INI-files. Control the
configuration in menu Window|Configuration.

Installation on a server

First install SWI-Prolog-Editor from one client on the server. From each other client you start the setup-
programm from the server and choose Connect to create a desktop-icon and an entry in the start menu.

Installation in INI-Files

If user-configurations can't be saved in the Windows-Registry because of protector-cards you install SWI-
Prolog-Editor with INI-Files support.

With this type of installation the INI-file SWIMachine.INI is created in the installation-folder with the
system-specific configuration in the tabsheets Program and Documentation. If SWI-Prolog-Editor
recogniceses during startup this INI-File in it's start-folder, he uses the configuration from this INI-file
instead from the Windows-Registry.

The user-specific configuration are stored in other folders in INI-files. I suggest to use the home-directories
of the users, because there is write-access. The home-directory should be accessible on a local drive, by a
mapped network drive or direct by UNC-folder-naming. If necessary you can use the variable %Username%
in the destination folder for the user-specific folder.

After installation and configuration the administrator can set the INI-files in the installation-folder to read-
only. So pupils cannot change configuration of the system-specific configuration.

Deinstallation

For deinstallation you execute setup.exe in the installation-folder. After deinstalltion you manually delete
setup.exe.
Material

The SWI-Prolog-Editor also supports the XPCE-System, with which you can write Windows-Programs. In
particular graphic outputs are possible. The following applications of the XPCE-Systems are offered:

 a turtle for Prolog

 a graphical Terminterpreter

Documentation

SWI-Prolog is an outstanding Prolog-implementation of Jan Wielemaker. For use in school the console-
mode isn't really suitable. The SWI-Prolog-Editor is a pupil-oriented and instruction-suited development
environment for work with SWI-Prolog.

Overview

In the illustration you can see the program-window of the SWI-Prolog-Editor with menu- and symbol-
border. In the left window the Prolog-program family.pl is loaded, the right window shows the contents of
the SWI-Prolog-help.

Beneath is the SWI-Prolog-window, which currently is answering the question?- parent(X, maria).
File-Menu

The File-Menu has in addition to the standard-operations like new, open, save and print, the export-
operation in HTML- and RTF-format. This enables pupils to use the syntaxhighlighting in their
documentation and teachers to use it for classwork.

Edit-Menu and Editor-Symbols

The Editor supports the Windows-clipboard, search and replace functions with multilevel undo-facilities.
Via symbols one can place and seek bookmarks, line-numbers are showed optionally. If the cursor is
positioned direct in front of a bracket, you can jump with the bracket-symbol to the corresponding second
bracket. Marked textblocks may be un-/indented, un-/commented or copied to the clipboard in text-, HTML-
or RTF-format.

Start-Menu

With the consult-operation of the Start-Menu or the corresponding symbol you can consult the prolog-
program in the active window. With doubleclick on a error-message or -warning or with the context-menu
of the SWI-Prolog-Window the cursor is positioned on the errorline in the sourcecode.

When dealing with a query the commands continue and cancel are activated. So you can ask for another
solution or cancel the query.

If necessary one can start SWI-Prolog new via the command restart.

Test-Menu

With the commands in the Test-Menu you execute a programm in trace-modus in steps, set or reset
breakpoints and display the call-stack.

Window-Menu

Besides the standard window-commands like arrange, open and close windows, you can choose the desired
font and execute the configuration-facility:
Configuration

Program

The path to the SWI-Prolog-directory must be set. You do this by using the Select-button as the other paths
will be are adjusted accordingly. Based on the Prolog-Folder the dependant documentation-directories will
be determined.

Parameter is the command-line option for SWI-Prolog. By default 32 MB are reserved for the local stack.
Documentation

Here you configure the directories for the commands in the Help-Menu.
You can also use the Online-Documentation:

 http://gollem.science.uva.nl/SWI-Prolog/Manual/Contents.html
 http://gollem.science.uva.nl/SWI-Prolog/Manual/DocIndex.html
 http://hcs.science.uva.nl/projects/xpce/UserGuide/

For better performance the used documentation-files are cached, which means locally saved. By default as
cache-folder C:\Documents and Settings\\Application Data\SWI-Prolog-Editor\Cache is used.
Editor

The Tab width is adjustable. With activated Smarttabs the tab-key will automatically position the cursor at
the next word-beginning of the previous line.

Indent is used for marked textblocks.

Autoindent places after pressing the return-key the cursor at the position of the first nonspace character of
the previous line.

The Author will be automatically carried over if you create a new prolog-file.

With Encoding you set the default encoding of new source-files.

Under Structure you define how predicates, facts and rukes are shown in the file-structure.
Code

On this tab you activate the code-completion and parameter-hints and define the delay in milliseconds. The
code-completion is activated with the tab-key. It shows all predicates which start with the previously entered
letters.

For code-completion the Prolog-Documentation must be installed.

Colors

Here you can configure the colors for the syntax-highlighting.

If you choose a syntax-element on the left side, it's color and textattributs are shown on the right. Click on
the desired colors and textattributes. The button Standard resets all colors to the standard-colors.
Browser

If the internet-explorer is installed you can use it internally in SWI-Prolog-Editor to display the
documentation.

If you wish to use the browser externally the functions of Browser-Title and Alt-Keys for "File open" in
Browser are required. The SWI-Prolog-editor checks first whether the standard-browser is already loaded.
To do this it uses the browser-titel, for example Netscape Navigator or Internet Explorer. If the standard-
browser is already loaded, the HTML-file to be showed is placed in the addressfield of the command File
open. To achieve this the File-Menu is activated with Alt-F und O chooses the open-command. So one needs
FO in the corresponding input field.
Printer

Here you set the Printing-Parameters

Header and footer are separated in three sections, left, middle and right. The #-character is used for
separating the sections. Besides fixed Text you can use the following variables to print some special
elements:

%FILE% the filename

%PATH% the filename inclusive the folder
%DATE% the date of printing
%TIME% the time of printing
%PAGENUM% the page-number
%PAGECOUNT% the total amount of pages
Options

Here you have some options

With the option Integrated SWI-Prolog-Window you can choose between the integrated or the original SWI-
Prolog-Window.

With Return to continue you can use the return-key to ask for the next solution of your query. This is easier
than the standard ";".

With this option the no-/trace-symbol also deactivates the debug-modus.

It is advised to activate .pl-files link with SWI-Prolog-Editor. So you can open pl-files in the windows-
explorer with doubleclick.

At the ende you can choose a language-file.

Help-Menu

The Help-Menu gives you access to the documentation of SWI-Prolog and XPCE. You can organize the
help with own favorites.

If the cursor is placed over a predefined predicate the indexsearch F1 shows the corresponding description
from the HTML-documentation.

Editor

The Editor is based on the SynEdit-Komponente. Besides the usual editor-functions it serves indent- and
unindent of textblocks (shift+ctrl+I [indent] bzw. shift-ctrl-U [unindent]), delete line (ctrl+Y), delete to end
of line (shift+ctrl+Y) and administration of ten bookmarks (set/delete shift+ctrl+#, jump ctrl+#). You can set
and delete bookmarks directly in the bookmark-column.