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<H1>6.3. Object Management</H1>
<HR>
<H2><A NAME="Overview">6.3.1. Overview</A></H2>
<P><EM>Object management</EM> is a collection of features which support:</P>
<OL>
<LI>the definition of special objects in configuration files
<LI>the use of these special objects in documents.</OL>
<P>For example, a configuration file can contain a lookup table of <A HREF="../ref/creferen.html">references</A>. Within a document:</P>
<UL>
<LI>a table of references can be inserted by simply specifying document codes - the document names are found from the lookup table
<LI>REF/DOC object phrases are validated as legal references/documents
<LI>hypertext is generated for:<UL>
<LI>entries in the table of references
<LI>REF and DOC object phrases</UL>
<LI>REF objects can be converted to DOC objects and visa versa.</UL>
<P><A HREF="http://www.mincom.com/mtr/sdf/">SDF</A> supports 4 predefined <EM>classes</EM> of objects - <A HREF="../ref/creferen.html">references</A>, <A HREF="../ref/cterms.html">terms</A>, <A HREF="../ref/cproduct.html">products</A> and <A HREF="../ref/corganis.html">organisations</A>. New classes can be added via the <A HREF="../ref/mclass.html">class</A> macro.</P>
<HR>
<H2><A NAME="The Predefined Classes">6.3.2. The Predefined Classes</A></H2>
<P>The fields supported by the predefined classes are given below.</P>
<TABLE CLASS="columns" BORDER>
<TR CLASS="heading">
<TD>
<STRONG>Class</STRONG>
</TD>
<TD>
<STRONG>Styles</STRONG>
</TD>
<TD>
<STRONG>Identifer fields</STRONG>
</TD>
<TD>
<STRONG>Property fields</STRONG>
</TD>
</TR>
<TR>
<TD>
references
</TD>
<TD>
REF, DOC
</TD>
<TD>
Reference, Document
</TD>
<TD>
Jump, Version, Status
</TD>
</TR>
<TR>
<TD>
terms
</TD>
<TD>
TERM
</TD>
<TD>
Term, Definition
</TD>
<TD>
Jump
</TD>
</TR>
<TR>
<TD>
products
</TD>
<TD>
PRD
</TD>
<TD>
Name
</TD>
<TD>
Jump
</TD>
</TR>
<TR>
<TD>
organisations
</TD>
<TD>
ORG, ORGN
</TD>
<TD>
Name, Long
</TD>
<TD>
Jump
</TD>
</TR>
</TABLE>

<P><EM>Styles</EM> are the tags used for objects in the class. The first style is the 'normal' one. The second style is the 'long' one.</P>
<P><EM>Identifier fields</EM> are the 'normal' and 'long' (if any) fields within the data tables. <EM>Property fields</EM> are the additional fields, if any.</P>
<P><HR WIDTH="80%" ALIGN="Left">
<STRONG>Note: </STRONG>The <A HREF="../ref/mbuild_t.html">build_title</A> macro uses the <A HREF="../ref/creferen.html">references</A> declarations to provide default values for DOC_CODE, DOC_VERSION, DOC_STATUS and DOC_URL.
<HR WIDTH="80%" ALIGN="Left"></P>
<P>The <EM>objects</EM> module provides some commonly used objects in these predefined classes (and matching variables).</P>
<HR>
<H2><A NAME="Declaring Objects">6.3.3. Declaring Objects</A></H2>
<P>To declare a table of objects, the syntax is:</P>
<PRE>
  !block <EM>class</EM>; data
  <EM>field names</EM>
  <EM>object record1</EM>
  ...
  <EM>object recordN</EM>
  !endblock
</PRE>
<P>An example lookup table for organisations is given below.</P>
<PRE>
!block organisations; data
Name        Long                             Jump
DEC         Digital Equipment Corporation    http://www.dec.com
Frame       Frame International              http://www.frame.com
HP          Hewlett Packard                  http://www.hp.com
IBM         International Business Machines  http://www.ibm.com
Mincom      Mincom Pty Ltd                   http://www.mincom.com
Microsoft   Microsoft Corporation            http://www.microsoft.com
!endblock
</PRE>
<P>To insert a table of objects, the syntax is:</P>
<PRE>
  !block <EM>class</EM>
  <EM>field names</EM>
  <EM>object key or record1</EM>
  ...
  <EM>object key or recordN</EM>
  !endblock
</PRE>
<P>If only the key is provided, then the 'long' name is found from the configured data, if any. For example, a configuration file may have the following declaration of <A HREF="../ref/cterms.html">terms</A>:</P>
<PRE>
  !block terms; data
  Term     Definition
  SDF      Simple Document Format
  SQL      Structured Query Language
  !endblock
</PRE>
<P>These can then be inserted into a document as follows:</P>
<PRE>
  !block terms
  Term     Definition
  SDF
  SQL
  WWW      World Wide Web
  !endblock
</PRE>
<P>Note that the definition for a term already declared will be inserted if none is provided. Furthermore, new terms (like WWW above) can be inserted and added to the configured ones.</P>
<HR>
<H2><A NAME="Hypertext and Name Conversion">6.3.4. Hypertext and Name Conversion</A></H2>
<P>If an object has a 'Jump' property defined for it, hypertext is automatically generated for it. For example:</P>
<PRE>
 See {{DOC:My Design Document}} for further details
</PRE>
<P>will have a jump created for the DOC object.</P>
<P>Object names can be converted between the normal and long forms by using the <EM>expand</EM> and <EM>shrink</EM> attributes. For example:</P>
<PRE>
 {{PRD:Java}} was developed by {{ORG[expand]Sun}}.
</PRE>
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