Metalanguage, letter O

object, objectref, openargument, openparameters, oref, orientation, owmethod, owproperty, owservice


object

Approved for inclusion in a future ANSI M[UMPS] language standard.

This metalanguage symbol represents an a reference to an object. Such a reference can be any expression that results in a value that is a handle or pointer to an object.


objectref

Approved for inclusion in a future ANSI M[UMPS] language standard.

This metalanguage symbol represents a reference to an object. An object in this context may be a global variable, a routine, a process, a device, a name in the LOCK table, a library, a character set, etcetera.


openargument

Introduced in the 1977 ANSI M[UMPS] language standard.

This metalanguage symbol represents an occurrence of an argument of the OPEN command. Examples of valid arguments for the OPEN command appear in an earlier section. The argument of the OPEN command is either an expression, optionally followed by more expressions (separated by colons), or an indirection operator (@) followed by an expression that evaluates to a list (separated by commas) of such arguments.


openparameters

Introduced in the 1977 ANSI M[UMPS] language standard.

This metalanguage symbol represents any implementation-specific parameters to be observed for the device or file being opened, optionally followed by a time-out specification. The implementation-specific parameters may be either a single expression, or a list of expressions (separated by colons), enclosed in parentheses.


oref

Approved for inclusion in a future ANSI M[UMPS] language standard.

This metalanguage symbol represents any value that has the data type OREF, i.e. any value that is a handle or pointer to an object.


orientation

Introduced in the 1995 ANSI M[UMPS] Windowing Application Programmer's Interface standard.

This metalanguage symbol represents a code for the orientation of an entity. This metalanguage symbol occurs as an expression that evaluates to either "H" (horizontal) or "V" (vertical), or to an implementation-specific value (starts with "Z").


owmethod

Approved for inclusion in a future ANSI M[UMPS] language standard.

This metalanguage symbol represents a method of an object. Such a reference looks like an expression that identifies an object, followed by a period, followed by the name of that property (optionally followed by a parameter list enclosed in parentheses; parameters are separated by commas).


owproperty

Approved for inclusion in a future ANSI M[UMPS] language standard.

This metalanguage symbol represents a property of an object. Such a reference looks like an expression that identifies an object, followed by a period, followed by the name of that property (optionally followed by a parameter list enclosed in parentheses; parameters are separated by commas).


owservice

Approved for inclusion in a future ANSI M[UMPS] language standard.

This metalanguage symbol represents a property or method of an object. Such a reference looks like an expression that identifies an object, followed by a period, followed by the name of that property (optionally followed by a parameter list enclosed in parentheses; parameters are separated by commas).


This document is © Ed de Moel, 1995-2005.
It is part of a book by Ed de Moel that is published under the title "M[UMPS] by Example" (ISBN 0-918118-42-5).
Printed copies of the book are no longer available.

This document describes the various metalanguage terms starting with the letter "O" that are used throughout the M[UMPS] standards, as well as some other terms that may not be obvious to all readers of the M[UMPS] language standards.

The information in this document is NOT authoritative and subject to be modified at any moment.
Please consult the appropriate (draft) language standard for an authoritative definition.

In this document, information is included that will appear in future standards.
The MDC cannot guarantee that these 'next' standards will indeed appear.