Command History

command history window The Command History lists the commands that have been entered since Chimera startup; all or a chosen subset can be re-executed or saved to a file. The Command History can be opened from the pulldown menu marked by a black triangle to the right of the Command Line. The menu also shows the most recently entered commands. Commands are shown as entered even if they failed to execute due to mistyping or incorrect syntax.

Individual commands or blocks of commands may be chosen (highlighted) using the left mouse button. Ctrl-click adds to an existing choice rather than replacing it. To choose a block of commands without dragging, click on the first (or last) and then Shift-click on the last (or first) in the desired block. The choice of a single command, but not a block of commands, can be moved up and down the list using the keyboard up arrow and down arrow or Ctrl-p and Ctrl-n.

Record... brings up a dialog for saving the chosen commands to a new file or appending them to an existing file. Either the commands or their Python translations can be saved. A command file can be helpful when the same set of commands will be used repeatedly.

Execute executes the chosen commands in the order shown; double-clicking an individual command executes that command.

Close dismisses the Command History window; Help opens this manual page in a browser window.

Python Translations of Commands

A file containing the Python translations of commands cannot be executed in Chimera until statements to import any necessary modules have been added. In some cases, adding

import Midas
to the beginning of the file will be sufficient; however, additional modules may need to be imported, depending on the particular commands included and any further code that is added to the file.


UCSF Computer Graphics Laboratory / December 2007